I normally start out every Warhammer Online article with a now famous quote by Vice President of Mythic Mark Jacobs, but at this point perhaps we can manage with just a bite,

“If you’ve seen a game consolidate servers, you know it’s in deep, deep trouble.”
-Mark Jacobs

Following the huge layoffs at Mythic, and the hints of desperation summoned by the endless trial system, it comes as a surprise to absolutely nobody that Mythic has announced that more servers will be shutting down in the near future.

On the American side, Dark Crag and Phoenix Throne are shutting down, where Europe has at least one server shutting down in the near future. Transfers are set to begin soon, if they haven’t already, and players will be given 20% experience bonuses on their new servers to ease the pain. After this shutdown, Warhammer Online will have five servers in North America, and Europe with eleven servers.

More on Warhammer Online after the break…

I don’t find the server closings any more disturbing than I do the recent address by Executive Producer Jeff Hickman, who assured players that the game is going to continue being improved upon, turning around what was indisputably a disappointing first year. Being an avid MMO player, I’m not stupid (seriously), and I’ve heard this before:

And going from there, I think it’s fair to say that every product all the time is being looked at for how it’s performing and things like that, and we see improvement happening in Tabula Rasa. We’re encouraged by it.
-David Reid, NCWest President of Publishing.

David Reid said this in an interview with Massively in September 2008, voicing his assurance that Tabula Rasa was improving and had the full support of NCSoft. To those of you keeping score, NCSoft would announce the closure of Tabula Rasa two months later. Oh and that NCsoft hardly mentions Tabula Rasa to this day, and when they do it is with nothing but contempt and disappointment.

I don’t take glee at the financial failures of others, but I had to give a hearty chuckle at the thought of Warhammer Online having only slightly more servers than Star Wars Galaxies. The main difference in the two titles is that at least the Sony team has a sense of humor, if unintentionally, when it comes to shutting down servers (“We’re doing so well, that we’re consolidating!”) where all Warhammer Online has is a quote that not only makes their situation seem worse, but provides plenty of fodder for fanboys/trolls of questionable motives.

Pacing and gameplay evolution are very important and at times overlooked factors in any MMO. The actions and motivations of a day one player are very different than those of a two year veteran, and good game design takes that into consideration. What can be enjoyable in the first month might very well be considered a ‘grind’ one year in, and something that might cause confusion after a few weeks could be a key feature keeping someone around month after month.

Themeparks get off easy in this regard because the developer is always in control of the rope pulling you forward, and they decide what is available to you day one, day one hundred, and ultimately on your last day. On the other hand a sandbox by design does not have such a rope, but rather multiple points-of-interest that server to motivate and influence, but never force, player behavior.

DarkFall has not always had the smoothest progression path, and while improved today it still has a ways to go before it’s fully there. Beyond the differences in control and UI, I believe the initial pacing of the game is currently solid. Skill gain from 1-50 is IMO relatively fast for most skills, and a skill at 50 is generally ‘good enough’. In relatively short order (10 hours?) you can be well on your way to establishing your preferred method of combat (melee/archery/magic), and in that time the average player should be comfortable with the controls, immediate environment, and basic concepts of the game. You certainly won’t be a master at anything, but your character should begin to establish an identity and purpose (being a part of a clan at this point will of course help in both regards, but motivated solo players should be fine).

In-game this means exploring and finding local mob spawns that are a good source of skill and loot gain, building up your bank, and learning the basics of crafting, PvE, and PvP (likely from getting attacked) combat. If you are part of a clan at this point you are likely still focusing more on PvE than PvP, with the major difference being that you are hunting mobs around your clan’s current location rather than a starter city, perhaps even in small groups. You can still join in on any PvP runs (with the knowledge that you will likely be going up against superior enemies and 1v1 situations will result in death, so just play your part and help out rather then trying to play the spearhead of any attack), and you will be included in major events such as sieges or large raids.

At some point later down the road (30-40 hours?), player motivation and gameplay should shift from discovery and growth to role execution. At this point your core skills should be around 75 or above, your secondary skills should be coming along, and you should have a solid understanding of most in-game mechanics and happenings. Your in-game time should be shifting away from focused skill gain to doing and reacting to what is happening around you (which is why a clan is key for all but the most self-motivated individuals), and through those actions your skills will continue to increase more ‘naturally’.

In-game this means you are now hunting mobs with a more focused goal (enchanting mats, gold for a specific skill/goal, rank 40+ weapons), and really working on your PvP skills, both group and solo. You should be able to hold your own in most combat situations (although power-gamers will still dominate you), and most importantly that initial rush and panic will be controlled.

The final ‘phase’ in a sandbox is true role pursuit and acceptance. Whether this means being a powerful economic force, a name to be fears on the battlefield, a regarded tactician, or simply a local area menace, you should have SOME purpose other than more gold/skills. Your character should be ‘done’ in most areas, with perhaps some secondary goals that serve more as a side project than a true need.

In-game this is where a sandbox shines, because the number of options and possibilities should be great, and the ability to change direction should be possible without a complete re-roll. This is also the stage of the game where upcoming additions and changes affect you most, and you should be heavily involved (directly or otherwise) in the ‘end-game’ of politics, city warfare, and empire building. The amount of content here should be nearly endless, as things such as alliances and military power change almost daily. Your allies today might be your enemy tomorrow and vice versa.

It’s this final phase that is both the major strength and current weakness of DarkFall. On the one hand, it deserves credit for having such a solid and functional end-game this early in its MMO life. That you want to and can siege a city without the server blowing up is more of an accomplishment then you might think, considering MMO history like SB (SB.exe), AoC (instanced city fails), WAR (the whole endgame), WoW (world PvP and Wintergrasp fails), Aion (fortresses). At the same time, clearly some issues exist, such as OP AoE magic, 6 hour sieges, ships and warhulk functionality, etc. And compared to other sandbox titles such as UO (pre-tram) and EVE, DarkFall is lacking the true depth those titles features in areas such as economic balance and possibility, non-combat influence/power, and RP/fluff possibilities (think player-made orc clans in UO).

The good news is that because of it’s solid base, developer time can and is being focused on adding and expending those areas rather than continually trying to get the core working, so while DarkFall might not be the game for you right now Mr. Exclusive Crafter Economy guy, it should/will be at some point ‘soon’, and when you do join up, you’ll have a lot of other options to entertain you as well.

(DarkFall-related post disclaimer/reminder. If you click the image link near the top-right of this page and buy a DarkFall account, I get paid 20% of the client cost. If you believe this taints my views and reporting on DarkFall, your opinion is wrong.)

The next in my series of “Beginner’s Guides” for WAR:  Apothecary.

This Crafting Profession has been a favorite for a lot of people ever since its revamp which included the addition of Hybrid Potions at Rank 40.  Lately, with Butchering’s changes, it’s become more popular than ever.

Enjoy!

~Gaar

Quick Explanation of Crafting in WAR

WAR has a two-stage crafting system.  The first stage is handled through a “gathering” profession and the second stage is the actual “crafting” profession.

Here’s the rundown:

Apothecary - Crafting Profession – Makes potions with various temporary effects.

• Butchering - Gathering Profession – Harvests monsters for items to use in making potions.
• Cultivation - Gathering Profession – Grows plants and fungi to use in making potions.

Talisman Making – Crafting Profession – Makes talismans that can be added to worn items to boost stats.

• Magical Salvaging - Gathering Profession – Deconstructs items for the parts to use in making talismans.
• Scavenging - Gathering Profession – Harvests players/NPCs for items to use in making talismans.

At the time this guide was created, all Gathering professions were viable for use in each of their respective Crafting professions.  However, each Crafting profession has its own pros and cons, as does each gathering profession.  It is best to understand those pros/cons before selecting your professions, however you are able to change both your Crafting and Gathering profession at any time (however at the loss of all progress).

Crafting Storage

Most of the items you will use in your crafting will be tradeable, thus can be stored not just in your own inventory, but also your Personal Bank Vault and your Guild Bank Vault.  The exception to this rule currently are the Hybrid Seeds that are looted in Tier 4.

You have two options now for storing them in your personal inventory though.  Crafting items will automatically (upon purchase/loot) go to your Crafting Item Inventory.  This is the third tab of your Backpack as shown in the picture below.

This special inventory space starts with only one bag, but you gain more bags by leveling your crafting professions.  You gain a new bag for each 100 points you earn in each profession, giving you a total of five bags when you’re done.

If you run out of space here, items will start to automatically go into your regular inventory.  Items can be moved back and forth between the two types of personal storage areas by right-clicking on them.

Finally, no discussion of Crafting Storage would be complete without mentioning the Mail System.  :p

All tradeable items can be sent back and forth between alts (alternate characters on your account) and friends, then left in your mailbox unopened for a good deal of time.  Proper mailbox use can extend your personal storage space for tradeable items infinitely.

Selecting your Crafting and Gathering Professions

As a new player, your first exposure to Crafting trainers comes in Chapter 2 of the WAR Story.  (The PvE towns in WAR are designated as Chapters and the PvE road moves you through these Chapters in sequential order.)  If you are on a Trial Account, this is the only place you can learn these professions.

Those players with subscriptions to WAR can also train in their Capital City (Altdorf or the Inevitible City).

It costs no money to train or re-train a Crafting profession.  You can change your profession at any time, however you will lose all progress you have made in that profession.

The Apothecary, Cultivator and Hedge Wizard (Talisman Making) trainers also are Merchants selling items for their respective craft.

Once you’ve made your choice, it’s time to level your profession(s).  For the sake of this guide, let’s assume you’ve made Apothecary your Crafting profession.

Apothecary Overview

Apothecary is all about making potions, potions and more…dyes.  Go figure. 

Of the two full Crafting professions, Apothecary is the one with the most “wiggle room”.  In other words, there isn’t just one way to make things.  Yes, only certain ingredients make the potions you want.  However, the additives you use can vary from things that make  you more potions with each craft to things that make the duration on potions longer.  Because of this, you have the freedom to make potions that fit you and the way you play.  (Granted, some additives are almost required for certain potions to maximize their effects.)

As you can tell from my first sentence, Apothecary is the “bulk” crafting profession.  Not only do you need to make lots of potions just to use, but you need to go through lots of crafting sessions just to get the lucky rolls to get the good potions as well.  It’s not uncommon to sit down with a couple hundred ingredients and knock out a bunch of potions all at once just to get 30-40 of the ones you really want to use and toss the rest on the Auction House cheap or just Merchant them.

Once you get to end-game Apothecary, you’ll want to hunt down the rare ingredients for Liniments.  These Hybrid potions are must-haves for Potion Makers.  This can take quite a bit of effort, but is worth it in the end.

Compared to Talisman Making, there is a lot more work involved, however because of the usefulness of potions and their limited nature, it’s well worth the effort.

Must-Have Addons for Apothecary

There really is only one Addon you need to have for Apothecary:  Crafting Info Tooltip.

To be honest, it’s a must-have for all Crafting/Gathering professions.  It’s just that good.

Why?  Because it shows you the “hidden” crafting information for each item when you hover over them in your inventory.  This is invaluable information for all crafters, especially when you want to make very specific things and at maximum potency.  Understanding the information it provides is the key to being a great crafter.

Go to Curse.com and do a search for this Addon and download it.  I prefer to manually install all my Addons.  It’s not difficult.  However, if you’d rather not, you can use the Curse Client instead.  (I’m not a fan as it’s always had issues on Patch Day when the new versions of addons come out and the old ones don’t always work.)

Note:  Some people like to use another Addon that is supposed to do a lot of the work for you when making Potions, however once you understand the math behind Apothecary, there really is no need for any additional Addon beyond Crafting Info Tooltip.

Leveling Apothecary

While I usually recommend just buying your ingredients to level the first 25 points in these professions, with Apothecary I don’t.  For one, it’s a lot more expensive to do than with the other professions.  The main reason though, is that you should be leveling either Butchering or Cultivation at the same time so you should have loads of free ingredients to use to level with.

What you do need to buy right away is at least one stack of 20 Apprentice’s Glass Vials.  Grab 40 if you can afford it.  You’ll need these while out running around so you can level your skill as you go instead of stocking up on ingredients and then doing it all at once which can just crowd your inventory at lower levels.

Just as with Talisman Making, the skill level of your Main Ingredient is what determines your ability to raise your skill with each craft.  (ie:  Once you hit skill 25, you need to use level 25 ingredients to continue leveling quickly.)

Once you have your Vials, open up the Abilities window and click on the General tab on the far right.  Drag the Apothecary icon to your toolbar.  Click the icon on your toolbar to open your Crafting Window.

Kinda empty, huh?  Open your Crafting Inventory and right-click on a Vial to load it into the window.

Now you’re ready to start.

The top-left slot is for your Main Ingredient.  You can simply right-click it in your Crafting Inventory to load it into the window.  The bottom three slots are for your additives.  These are primarily going to be taken up with Stabilizers in the beginning, however later you’ll also want to include things like Extenders and Duration modifiers.  More on those later.

Once you have added your Vial and your Main Ingredient, you will want to add a couple Stabilizers (these are prevalent in both Gathering professions or you can buy Water off the Merchant) until the Stability bar on the top right is all the way up in the green.  Once it is, hit the Brew! button.

You can continue leveling your skill in this manner by making “junk” potions until you hit 200 skill.  However, since you’re probably also leveling your character as well, you might as well learn to do it right and make things you’ll actually use in combat.  Use your “junk” ingredients to grind regular potions with and use your better ingredients (ie: additives) for the ones you want to use for yourself.  By leveling in this manner, you’ll always stay stocked with helpful potions, as any good Apothecary should!

Note:  If you have lots of higher-level ingredients, you can use the Apothecary skill potion (Alchemist Tonic) to boost your skill by 25 points for 30 minutes.  You can even make your own if you’re in a guild with access to the Guild Hall Merchant once you’re skill 50.  The item you use as the Main Ingredient is called Aggregate Compound and costs 1 gold.

Second Note:  You can also craft these items to help level with and sell the resulting Potion on the Auction House if there’s a market for that on your server.  There is also a level 100 ingredient called Revivification Compound that makes a Resuscitation Potion that is usually in fair demand, although the ingredient alone costs 15 gold.  I would save this for end-game crafting when you can make multiple for each ingredient due to the cost.

The Four Categories of Potions

While certain potions override others when you use them, there are four general categories of potions that can be used with each other since they don’t override the other or trigger a reuse timer.

• Insta-use Potions – Heals, Energy and Damage Absorb/Shield potions fall into this category.
• Stat Potions – Basic stats like Strength and Willpower, as well as the Hybrid Liniments, fall into this category.
• Defensive Potions – Things like Armor, Thorn and Resist potions fall into this category.
• Combat Potions – Molotov, Flame Breath and other combat potions all fall into this category.

Keeping this in mind, a skilled Apothecary can keep themselves and their friends outfitted with a full complement of potions to help them achieve victory in battle.  (For example, as a Tank in RvR at Rank 40, I like to use a Liniment and a Resist potion while also having both types of Heal potions ready and a Napalm potion for fun.)

Basic Potion-making Information

Once you have a bit of practice under your belt and are familiar with how Apothecary works in regards to making a stable potion, it’s time to try your hand at making potions you can actually use as opposed to just leveling.

With six different items that can be combined in various ways, this is where Apothecary becomes more complex than Talisman Making.

First off, when making potions for actual use, Vials matter.  Using the highest level Vial you’re qualified for is a must in these cases.  As they go up in level, they add both Stability and Power which are two very important factors in making good potions.

Second comes the Main Ingredient.  You will want to pay special attention to the level of the ingredient you’re using and the Power it is going to provide your potion, as well as its Stability rating.  The total Power of your potion is going to determine the Rank of player that can use it as well as how strong it will be.

Next come the four different types of additives for your potions:  Stabilizers, Extenders, Multipliers and Stimulants.

Stabilizers do just what they say, they stabilize your potion so it will be successful.  These are required in nearly all potions you will make, so get familiar with the different kinds available to you.  (Currently Cultivation provides the best Stabilizer in the game: Goldweed.  This Stabilizer not only acts as its namesake but also adds a Multiplier to the potion.)

Extenders increase the duration of the effect the potion will have.  Maximizing duration is great for things like basic stat potions, Heal over Time potions and others.  However, they are completely unnecessary on things like Direct Heal potions or Energy potions.

Multipliers do just what they say, they multiply the number of potions you get from each crafting attempt.  These are great for things like Direct Heal potions where you want to make lots of them all at once.  (Currently Butchering has the best Multiplier in the game.  It allows you to make six potions with each crafting attempt.)

Finally, Stimulants increase the chance of you making a better potion.  Every crafting attempt you make has a chance to “crit” and create something better than the basic potion.  Using these ups your chances of that happening.  (That being said, it’s rarely a viable additive in the long run.  Extenders are much more desirable for potions that you want to last and Multipliers end up providing you with more of the potions when they do “crit” so there really is no reason to use Stimulants often.)

Armed with this information, you should be able to experiment with various combinations and create some very useful potions for yourself and your friends.

For more in-depth information to assist you in crafting usable potions while leveling, check out this guide by Irinia.  While some of the information is outdated, a lot of the basic information about how Power, Stability and Multipliers work should still be accurate.

Making Dyes

You didn’t think all Apothecaries did was make Potions did you? 

Both Cultivation and Butchering provide Pigments that can be used to craft Dyes by an Apothecary.  Here’s how it works.

Once you have a Pigment from your Gathering profession, you’ll need to go buy both a “Wooden Mortar and Pestle” and an “Alum Root Extract” from the Merchant.  These are both required to make Dyes and do not come from anywhere but the Merchant.

Open your Crafting Window and right-click the Mortar and Pestle to load it in.  This creates a new Dye-making version of the Apothecary window.

Once loaded, right-click the Pigment you want to turn into a Dye, then right-click the Alum Root Extract.  Once you have all three ingredients in, hit Brew! to make your new Dye.

Note:  Cultivation’s Pigments are tied to the level of the seeds as well as specific seeds once you’re using skill 200 seeds.  Butchering currently just drops the various Pigments at random, regardless of your skill level.

Advanced Apothecary

Once you’ve leveled your Apothecary skill to 200, you’re ready to learn more!

The best thing to do is to go to the following web sites and read up on the information they have to offer.  They are also places you can ask for more information on things that you aren’t sure about.

Also, don’t forget to use your in-game Advice channel as well!

Official Forums for Apothecary

Warhammer Alliance Forums for Apothecary

As it’s the last Mon-Wed-Fri I have before break, I want to throw in a quick post here to announce my crazy shenanigans.

• I apparently renewed my World of Warcraft account (I normally pay via the Blizzard Store and purchasing 30-day cards through it), but last month as I was raiding, I got the “You have 30 minutes left” warning in ToC 25 Heroic.  So I went and renewed my account… but through the WoW website, not the Blizzard Store.  A-durr.  So now I have a month of game time.  Went and told LE that I would be in after the break, as I do have a freaking thing to finish up in a few classes… I think I’ll finish up leveling my Shaman, perhaps level my Hunter.
• I picked up Borderlands.  Surprisingly a fun game.  It’s a pretty good mix of RPG and FPS, of which the last I played one of those was that one failed MMO… oh, what was it called… crap, can’t remember for the life of me (wait, it’s Hellgate: London);  I only know it lasted for like several months before people just disliked it.
• I reinstalled Oblivion.  I like the game, couldn’t run it too well on the old PC, but now I can (heh, it’s only like 3 years).  I really enjoy the genre of a RPG-FPS, and Oblivion is one of those games… though, I wish I could make an orc in that game really look orcish, can’t really do that.  Warhammer Online got their orcs right, as far as I’m concerned… stupid and crazy and all about the WAAAAAAAAAAGH!

That’s it for now.  More later.

The next in my series of “Beginner’s Guides” for WAR:  Talisman Making.

This Crafting Profession went through some fundamental changes a few patch cycles back, so if you’re new or just haven’t taken a look at it since then, read on.

Enjoy!

~Gaar

Quick Explanation of Crafting in WAR

WAR has a two-stage crafting system.  The first stage is handled through a “gathering” profession and the second stage is the actual “crafting” profession.

Here’s the rundown:

Apothecary - Crafting Profession – Makes potions with various temporary effects.

• Butchering - Gathering Profession – Harvests monsters for items to use in making potions.
• Cultivation - Gathering Profession – Grows plants and fungi to use in making potions.

Talisman Making – Crafting Profession – Makes talismans that can be added to worn items to boost stats.

• Magical Salvaging – Gathering Profession – Deconstructs items for the parts to use in making talismans.
• Scavenging - Gathering Profession – Harvests players/NPCs for items to use in making talismans.

At the time this guide was created, all Gathering professions were viable for use in each of their respective Crafting professions.  However, each Crafting profession has its own pros and cons, as does each gathering profession.  It is best to understand those pros/cons before selecting your professions, however you are able to change both your Crafting and Gathering profession at any time (however at the loss of all progress).

Crafting Storage

Most of the items you will use in your crafting will be tradeable, thus can be stored not just in your own inventory, but also your Personal Bank Vault and your Guild Bank Vault.  The exception to this rule currently are the Hybrid Seeds that are looted in Tier 4.

You have two options now for storing them in your personal inventory though.  Crafting items will automatically (upon purchase/loot) go to your Crafting Item Inventory.  This is the third tab of your Backpack as shown in the picture below.

This special inventory space starts with only one bag, but you gain more bags by leveling your crafting professions.  You gain a new bag for each 100 points you earn in each profession, giving you a total of five bags when you’re done.

If you run out of space here, items will start to automatically go into your regular inventory.  Items can be moved back and forth between the two types of personal storage areas by right-clicking on them.

Finally, no discussion of Crafting Storage would be complete without mentioning the Mail System.  :p

All tradeable items can be sent back and forth between alts (alternate characters on your account) and friends, then left in your mailbox unopened for a good deal of time.  Proper mailbox use can extend your personal storage space for tradeable items infinitely.

Selecting your Crafting and Gathering Professions

As a new player, your first exposure to Crafting trainers comes in Chapter 2 of the WAR Story.  (The PvE towns in WAR are designated as Chapters and the PvE road moves you through these Chapters in sequential order.)  If you are on a Trial Account, this is the only place you can learn these professions.

Those players with subscriptions to WAR can also train in their Capital City (Altdorf or the Inevitible City).

It costs no money to train or re-train a Crafting profession.  You can change your profession at any time, however you will lose all progress you have made in that profession.

The Apothecary, Cultivator and Hedge Wizard (Talisman Making) trainers also are Merchants selling items for their respective craft.

Once you’ve made your choice, it’s time to level your profession(s).  For the sake of this guide, let’s assume you’ve made Talisman Making your Crafting profession.

Talisman Making Overview

Talisman Making is all about…wait for it…making Talismans.  Shocking, right?

Of the two full Crafting professions, Talisman Making is the most straightforward in the sense that you can make the useful items you want without relying on a healthy dose of luck.  Sure, luck can get you something even nicer than what you planned on making at times, but ultimately, when you do the math the same every time, you get the same results every time.

Talisman Making is not really a “bulk” Crafting profession.  Sure, if you farm or have a guild/alliance that farms items for you, you can mass-produce at times.  However, it’s more about making that one item you or a friend needs than stacks of things.

If you don’t have people farming the things you need but instead buy what you need, this can be a very expensive profession.  Granted, not as expensive as just buying the end result at times, but still.  You do have to rely on items from each of the Gathering professions that feeds Talisman Making, so if you don’t have alts or a guild/alliance, this may not be for you.

Once you get to end-game Talisman Making, making the “perfect” talisman is never guaranteed.  Near-perfect is guaranteed and it’s only 1 point off the max in the case of base stats, so that’s not bad.  This keeps end-game Talisman Making on part with end-game Apothecary as neither have guaranteed results for “max” items.

Compared to Apothecary, there is a lot less “work” involved in Talisman Making which makes it very popular.

Must-Have Addons for Talisman Making

There really is only one Addon you need to have for Talisman Making:  Crafting Info Tooltip.

To be honest, it’s a must-have for all Crafting/Gathering professions.  It’s just that good.

Why?  Because it shows you the “hidden” crafting information for each item when you hover over them in your inventory.  This is invaluable information for all crafters, especially when you want to make very specific things and at maximum potency.  Understanding the information it provides is the key to being a great crafter.

Go to Curse.com and do a search for this Addon and download it.  I prefer to manually install all my Addons.  It’s not difficult.  However, if you’d rather not, you can use the Curse Client instead.  (I’m not a fan as it’s always had issues on Patch Day when the new versions of addons come out and the old ones don’t always work.)

Note:  Some people like to use another Addon that is supposed to do a lot of the work for you when making Talismans, however once you understand the math behind Talisman Making, there really is no need for any additional Addon beyond Crafting Info Tooltip.

Leveling Talisman Making

There are two ways to level your Talisman Making skill.  The first is just to buy all the items you need and craft away!  The second is to slowly level it along with the Gathering profession you have paired it with.  Ultimately, I find a combination of both to be the most efficient over time.

With that in mind, as a brand new Talisman Maker, I recommend getting your skill up to 25 via the Hedge Wizard that trained you or the nearest Merchant that sells Crafting items.  To do this, buy 24 Apprentice’s Relic Boxes and 24 Fragile Sorrel Hearts.  (I say that one only because you’re not going to use these talismans, so it really doesn’t matter which kind you make and that one is first in the list.)  This is fairly inexpensive as it only costs you 9 silver 60 copper total.

Note:  When crafting talismans purely to level your skill, ALWAYS use the Apprentice’s Relic Box.  There’s no need to waste any of the others, or your hard-earned coin, on leveling.  To be honest, there’s no reason to use them at all unless you have a nice Blue fragment you really, really hope turns into a Purple talisman.  At least, until you’re making end-game talismans that is.

Once you’ve trained Talisman Making, open up your Abilities window and click on the General tab at the far right.  Drag the Talisman Making icon to your toolbar.  Click the icon on your toolbar to open your Crafting window.

Time for a quick rundown of the areas in your window.  The top-left square is for your Boxes.  You can’t place anything anywhere else until you have a Box in place.  The top-middle area with the red dot is for your Fragment.  Once you have a Box and a Fragment, you can make a talisman.  The rest of the items are optional to help make the talisman more powerful.  They aren’t required for leveling though.

On the bottom, from left to right are areas for Gold Dust (Yellow), Curio (Green), and Magical Essence (Blue).  When you go to actually make a talisman you want to use, these will come in handy.

With your Crafting Inventory open and the Crafting Window open, right-click on the Apprentice’s Relic Box to load it and then right-click the Fragile Sorrel Heart to load it.  Once both are in, hite the Fuse! button.  Repeat for the entire stack of 24 and your skill will then be at 25.

At this point, if you have the extra coin, you can buy 100 more of each of the ingredients and get your skill up to 50.  That’s going to run you almost 1 gold though, so don’t bother if you’re not rolling in coin.

The cheaper, but more time-consuming method, is just to go out and work on leveling your Gathering profession and use the ingredients you get from those to level your Crafting skill.

The main thing to keep in mind when leveling Talisman Making is that the level of the Fragment you use is key.  Once you hit level 25, you’re going to want to use Fragments that require skill 25 to create to help level you to 50.  Once at 50, use Fragments that require skill 50.  Repeat to 200.

If you have a lot of Fragments stored up that are of a higher level than you can make, you can consider buying a Crafting Potion.  These potions are made by Apothecaries using ingredients only purchasable at the Guild Hall Merchant.  The one for Talisman Making is called Curator Tonic and the ingredient item used to make it (Aggregate Compound) costs 1 gold from the Guild Merchant.  Either have a friend make you one, buy one off the Auction House, or ask nicely in Region. 

Another interesting way to help you level Talisman Making after you hit 50 is to craft and sell Portal Stones.  For the purpose of leveling, you can easily price them just above cost and make your leveling cost you almost nothing overall.

Making Talismans to use while Leveling

While raising your skill is important, you can make very nice talismans to use as you level.  Obviously, Blue and Purple Fragments will be what you’ll want to use primarily.  However, if you don’t have any, you can still make decent talismans to use in the meantime with Green Fragments.

I recommend reading the information in this post by Serapis on the Official Forums before trying to craft Blue/Purple talismans.  They have compiled all the relevant information needed to reliably craft talismans under the current system.  (The web site they link to has it laid out even more simply.)

The main thing to keep in mind when crafting talismans is that the Power total matters.  Find the level of the gear you want to put a talisman in, match it to the level of talismans that can be made based on their chart and then make the total Power of your crafting attempt fall into the appropriate range.

As you craft more and more talismans using this formula, you’ll learn more about how to manage your Curios, Gold Dust and Essences to just hit the Power total you need.

Good luck!

Advanced Talisman Making

Once you’ve leveled your Talisman Making skill to 200, you’re ready to learn more!

The best thing to do is to go to the following web sites and read up on the information they have to offer.  They are also places you can ask for more information on things that you aren’t sure about.

Also, don’t forget to use your in-game Advice channel as well!

Official Forums for Talisman Making

Warhammer Alliance Forums for Talisman Making

The next in my series of “Beginner’s Guides” for WAR:  Magical Salvaging.

This Gathering profession has had its ups and downs.  Currently, it tends to take a back seat to Scavenging simply due to the ease of that profession.  However, for those who are patient and dedicated, Magical Salvaging offers a wider variety of options as well as some much-sought-after fragments!

Enjoy!

~Gaar

Quick Explanation of Crafting in WAR

WAR has a two-stage crafting system.  The first stage is handled through a “gathering” profession and the second stage is the actual “crafting” profession.

Here’s the rundown:

Apothecary - Crafting Profession – Makes potions with various temporary effects.

• Butchering - Gathering Profession – Harvests monsters for items to use in making potions.
• Cultivation - Gathering Profession – Grows plants and fungi to use in making potions.

Talisman Making – Crafting Profession – Makes talismans that can be added to worn items to boost stats.

• Magical Salvaging – Gathering Profession – Deconstructs items for the parts to use in making talismans.
• Scavenging - Gathering Profession – Harvests players/NPCs for items to use in making talismans.

At the time this guide was created, all Gathering professions were viable for use in each of their respective Crafting professions.  However, each Crafting profession has its own pros and cons, as does each gathering profession.  It is best to understand those pros/cons before selecting your professions, however you are able to change both your Crafting and Gathering profession at any time (however at the loss of all progress).

Crafting Storage

Most of the items you will use in your crafting will be tradeable, thus can be stored not just in your own inventory, but also your Personal Bank Vault and your Guild Bank Vault.  The exception to this rule currently are the Hybrid Seeds that are looted in Tier 4.

You have two options now for storing them in your personal inventory though.  Crafting items will automatically (upon purchase/loot) go to your Crafting Item Inventory.  This is the third tab of your Backpack as shown in the picture below.

This special inventory space starts with only one bag, but you gain more bags by leveling your crafting professions.  You gain a new bag for each 100 points you earn in each profession, giving you a total of five bags when you’re done.

If you run out of space here, items will start to automatically go into your regular inventory.  Items can be moved back and forth between the two types of personal storage areas by right-clicking on them.

Finally, no discussion of Crafting Storage would be complete without mentioning the Mail System.  :p

All tradeable items can be sent back and forth between alts (alternate characters on your account) and friends, then left in your mailbox unopened for a good deal of time.  Proper mailbox use can extend your personal storage space for tradeable items infinitely.

Selecting your Crafting and Gathering Professions

As a new player, your first exposure to Crafting trainers comes in Chapter 2 of the WAR Story.  (The PvE towns in WAR are designated as Chapters and the PvE road moves you through these Chapters in sequential order.)  If you are on a Trial Account, this is the only place you can learn these professions.

Those players with subscriptions to WAR can also train in their Capital City (Altdorf or the Inevitible City).

It costs no money to train or re-train a Crafting profession.  You can change your profession at any time, however you will lose all progress you have made in that profession.

The Apothecary, Cultivator and Hedge Wizard (Talisman Making) trainers also are Merchants selling items for their respective craft.

Once you’ve made your choice, it’s time to level your profession(s).  For the sake of this guide, let’s assume you’ve made Salvaging your Gathering profession and Talisman Making your Crafting profession.

Salvaging Overview

Salvaging is the deconstruction of items (armor, weapons, jewelry) into ingredients for making Talismans.

Salvaging is another “pure” Gathering profession because there’s really just one step to it.  Take an item you have, click the Salvage icon, click the item, receive your ingredients.

Salvaging works well in both RvR and PvE, however at times it is much easier to farm PvE to obtain the items you want.  Unlike Scavenging, you won’t be flooded with items, however you have more of a choice in the items you get than the randomness of Scavenging.  Not to mention, you can Salvage every available stat with Salvaging whereas Scavenging only provides you with a small sub-set of them.

Salvaging also provides three of the four items required for Talisman Making, just as Scavenging does.  If you’re so inclined, you can sell off your extra Essences on the Auction House to supplement your income.

Must-Have Addons for Salvaging

There really is only one Addon you need to have for Salvaging:  Crafting Info Tooltip.

To be honest, it’s a must-have for all Crafting/Gathering professions.  It’s just that good.

Why?  Because it shows you the “hidden” crafting information for each item when you hover over them in your inventory.  This is invaluable information for all crafters, especially when you want to make very specific things and at maximum potency.  Understanding the information it provides is the key to being a great crafter.

Go to Curse.com and do a search for this Addon and download it.  I prefer to manually install all my Addons.  It’s not difficult.  However, if you’d rather not, you can use the Curse Client instead.  (I’m not a fan as it’s always had issues on Patch Day when the new versions of addons come out and the old ones don’t always work.)

Leveling Salvaging

Once you’ve trained Salvaging and have your Addon downloaded, it’s time to get started.

First off, go to your Abilities sheet, click on the General tab at the far right and then drag the Magical Salvaging icon to your toolbar.

Now you’re ready to start leveling.  Right off the bat, you have a choice to make.  You can choose to level only off items you loot, or you can choose to spend a little money up front to max out this first bit of skill using items from the Merchant.

I recommend the Merchant route at this stage.  Mainly because at this point it’s fairly inexpensive and very fast.  I’m going to walk you through it this way before discussing the loot-only path.

As a brand new Salvager, go to the Merchant and browse their Wares.  You’re looking for “Shattered Figurine”.  Once you find it, buy 19.  Yes, 19 exactly.  It will cost you 9 silver 50 copper up front, but you’ll be getting the bulk of this back in a moment, so don’t be afraid to spend it.

Once you have your 19 Shattered Figurines in your Crafting Inventory, click on the Magical Salvaging icon on your toolbar.  You cursor will become a miniature hammer.  Hover it over the stack of Shattered Figurines and left-click on it.  The item will deconstruct and you will either succeed or fail.  At this point though, it doesn’t really matter.  Your skill will go up regardless.  Continue doing this until the stack is completely gone and you will be at skill 20 which is the highest these items can take you.

Depending on your success rate, you will have anywhere from 2-4 Gold Dust and 15-17 Essences in your inventory.  Go ahead and sell those back to the Merchant.  The Essences command a high price so will earn you back the bulk of what you already spent.  Yay!

Now, buy 30 of the “Ruined Figurines”.  This will cost you a bit more, 37 silver 50 copper.  You will only be getting maybe 10 silver of this back.  Once you have them, go ahead and salvage them all and sell off the Gold Dust and Essences again.  You should now be at skill 50 for Salvaging.

While you could continue to bump it up slowly via the Merchant’s Ruined Figurines, at this point it’s far more economical to just level off looted items.  With your handy-dandy Addon, it’s easy to tell what’s going to be a good item to salvage to try to level with.  When you hover over the item in your inventory, it will give you a chance for success on the bottom of the tooltip.  A rating of “Difficult” is usually a guaranteed skill-up, if it succeeds.  Anything showing “Easy” is only going to give you a skill-up occasionally.  Anything marked “Trivial” will never give you a skill-up.

Note:  If you can afford to keep going with the Ruined Figurines, do it.  Until they become “Trivial”, you may as well milk them for what they’re worth and save the loot for the rest.

Second Note:  You can continue this method of “paying for leveling” indefinitely via the Auction House, however it will become very, very expensive.

For those of you who either don’t have the money or don’t want to spend it, leveling via the items you loot works in much the same manner, albeit much more slowly.

As you loot items that are green/blue/purple in rarity, go ahead and salvage them if you can’t use them.  (You cannot salvage white items, keep that in mind.)  Pay close attention to your tooltip to tell you your difficulty rating and chance of success.  You may want to save those purple items for when they’re guaranteed just so you can make a nice blue talisman for yourself.  :p

If you find that the items you’re looting are too difficult for you to salvage and/or you’re failing a lot, go back a Chapter and kill lower-level mobs/NPCs for a while and raise your salvaging until you can continue at the higher level.

As you can tell, this profession requires patience and dedication.  Leveling can be very, very slow when you’re doing it via loot which is how most do it.

Just like with Butchering and Scavenging, you will not hit skill 200 in Salvaging without entering Tier 4.  You will need to salvage the high-level loot to finish off your skill, so there’s no need to be in a hurry.

Advanced Salvaging

Once you’ve leveled your Salvaging skill to 200, you’re ready to learn more!

The best thing to do is to go to the following web sites and read up on the information they have to offer.  They are also places you can ask for more information on things that you aren’t sure about.

Also, don’t forget to use your in-game Advice channel as well!

Official Forums for Salvaging

Warhammer Alliance Forums for Salvaging

The next in my series of “Beginner’s Guides” for WAR:  Scavenging.

This Gathering profession is currently very popular.  One of the reasons for that is that it is very RvR-friendly since you can scavenge the corpses of your fallen foes.  Always a good time.

Enjoy!

~Gaar

Quick Explanation of Crafting in WAR

WAR has a two-stage crafting system.  The first stage is handled through a “gathering” profession and the second stage is the actual “crafting” profession.

Here’s the rundown:

Apothecary - Crafting Profession – Makes potions with various temporary effects.

• Butchering - Gathering Profession – Harvests monsters for items to use in making potions.
• Cultivation - Gathering Profession – Grows plants and fungi to use in making potions.

Talisman Making – Crafting Profession – Makes talismans that can be added to worn items to boost stats.

• Magical Salvaging - Gathering Profession – Deconstructs items for the parts to use in making talismans.
• Scavenging - Gathering Profession – Harvests players/NPCs for items to use in making talismans.

At the time this guide was created, all Gathering professions were viable for use in each of their respective Crafting professions.  However, each Crafting profession has its own pros and cons, as does each gathering profession.  It is best to understand those pros/cons before selecting your professions, however you are able to change both your Crafting and Gathering profession at any time (however at the loss of all progress).

Crafting Storage

Most of the items you will use in your crafting will be tradeable, thus can be stored not just in your own inventory, but also your Personal Bank Vault and your Guild Bank Vault.  The exception to this rule currently are the Hybrid Seeds that are looted in Tier 4.

You have two options now for storing them in your personal inventory though.  Crafting items will automatically (upon purchase/loot) go to your Crafting Item Inventory.  This is the third tab of your Backpack as shown in the picture below.

This special inventory space starts with only one bag, but you gain more bags by leveling your crafting professions.  You gain a new bag for each 100 points you earn in each profession, giving you a total of five bags when you’re done.

If you run out of space here, items will start to automatically go into your regular inventory.  Items can be moved back and forth between the two types of personal storage areas by right-clicking on them.

Finally, no discussion of Crafting Storage would be complete without mentioning the Mail System.  :p

All tradeable items can be sent back and forth between alts (alternate characters on your account) and friends, then left in your mailbox unopened for a good deal of time.  Proper mailbox use can extend your personal storage space for tradeable items infinitely.

Selecting your Crafting and Gathering Professions

As a new player, your first exposure to Crafting trainers comes in Chapter 2 of the WAR Story.  (The PvE towns in WAR are designated as Chapters and the PvE road moves you through these Chapters in sequential order.)  If you are on a Trial Account, this is the only place you can learn these professions.

Those players with subscriptions to WAR can also train in their Capital City (Altdorf or the Inevitible City).

It costs no money to train or re-train a Crafting profession.  You can change your profession at any time, however you will lose all progress you have made in that profession.

The Apothecary, Cultivator and Hedge Wizard (Talisman Making) trainers also are Merchants selling items for their respective craft.

Once you’ve made your choice, it’s time to level your profession(s).  For the sake of this guide, let’s assume you’ve made Scavenging your Gathering profession and Talisman Making your Crafting profession.

Scavenging Overview

Scavenging is just what it sounds like: rummaging through a dead guy’s pocket’s for ingredients to make talismans with.

Scavenging is what I refer to as a “pure” Gathering profession in that there is just one real stage to it.  Once an NPC/Player is dead, you scavenge it and loot the ingredients.  No other work is required.

Scavenging is big because it’s very RvR-friendly.  You can just go about your killing business and scavenge along the way.  Granted, not ideal in the midst of a frenetic battle, but it can still be done.

That being said, it’s also a bit of a “farming” gathering profession in that you can easily farm Public Quests or other areas to get lots of ingredients.

One thing to keep in mind with Scavenging is that it only produces three of the four items required for making talismans.  Of course, Magical Salvaging only produces three out of the four as well…  Because of this, you can make decent money selling off your excess Curios from Scavenging on the Auction House.

Must-Have Addons for Scavenging

There really is only one Addon you need to have for Scavenging:  Crafting Info Tooltip.

To be honest, it’s a must-have for all Crafting/Gathering professions.  It’s just that good.

Why?  Because it shows you the “hidden” crafting information for each item when you hover over them in your inventory.  This is invaluable information for all crafters, especially when you want to make very specific things and at maximum potency.  Understanding the information it provides is the key to being a great crafter.

Go to Curse.com and do a search for this Addon and download it.  I prefer to manually install all my Addons.  It’s not difficult.  However, if you’d rather not, you can use the Curse Client instead.  (I’m not a fan as it’s always had issues on Patch Day when the new versions of addons come out and the old ones don’t always work.)

Leveling Scavenging

Once you’ve trained the Scavenging profession and have your Addon downloaded and in the right folder, it’s time to go out and kill some people!

Really.  It’s that easy.

Note:  Make sure the NPC/Player’s level is close to your own.  You can level off NPC/Player’s up to five levels below you, however keeping the level at or above your own will also get you more regular experience to help you level your Rank along with Scavenging.  Killing things far weaker than you doesn’t help you level, but it will still provide you with ingredients, just ones appropriate to that level.

Once you’ve got your NPC/Player good and dead, loot it completely.  Once done, you’ll see flies appear over the dead body (if it’s scavenge-able that is).  The animation makes it really easy to see if what you’re killing is something you can scavenge.

Move your cursor over the dead body and it will turn into what look like tongs.  Right-Click to scavenge it and be sure to loot it all.

Once you’ve scavenged the body, it disappears completely.

One thing to keep in mind is that leveling Scavenging will be a slow process if you’re truly picking it up as a new player in Tier 1.  This is because your skill raises based on the level of NPC/Player you’re killing.  You won’t reach 200 Scavenging without killing NPCs/Playersin Tier 4.

Advanced Scavenging

Once you’ve leveled your Scavenging skill to 200, you’re ready to learn more!

The best thing to do is to go to the following web sites and read up on the information they have to offer.  They are also places you can ask for more information on things that you aren’t sure about.

Also, don’t forget to use your in-game Advice channel as well!

Official Forums for Scavenging

Warhammer Alliance Forums for Scavenging

The next in my series of “Beginner’s Guides” for WAR:  Butchering.

This Gathering profession recently got a lot of love and had a few of its fundamentals changed, so, Trial player or Veteran, it’s a good time to take a look at it.

Enjoy!

~Gaar

Quick Explanation of Crafting in WAR

WAR has a two-stage crafting system.  The first stage is handled through a “gathering” profession and the second stage is the actual “crafting” profession.

Here’s the rundown:

Apothecary - Crafting Profession – Makes potions with various temporary effects.

• Butchering - Gathering Profession – Harvests monsters for items to use in making potions.
• Cultivation - Gathering Profession – Grows plants and fungi to use in making potions.

Talisman Making – Crafting Profession – Makes talismans that can be added to worn items to boost stats.

• Magical Salvaging – Gathering Profession – Deconstructs items for the parts to use in making talismans.
• Scavenging - Gathering Profession – Harvests players/NPCs for items to use in making talismans.

At the time this guide was created, all Gathering professions were viable for use in each of their respective Crafting professions.  However, each Crafting profession has its own pros and cons, as does each gathering profession.  It is best to understand those pros/cons before selecting your professions, however you are able to change both your Crafting and Gathering profession at any time (however at the loss of all progress).

Crafting Storage

Most of the items you will use in your crafting will be tradeable, thus can be stored not just in your own inventory, but also your Personal Bank Vault and your Guild Bank Vault.  The exception to this rule currently are the Hybrid Seeds that are looted in Tier 4.

You have two options now for storing them in your personal inventory though.  Crafting items will automatically (upon purchase/loot) go to your Crafting Item Inventory.  This is the third tab of your Backpack as shown in the picture below.

This special inventory space starts with only one bag, but you gain more bags by leveling your crafting professions.  You gain a new bag for each 100 points you earn in each profession, giving you a total of five bags when you’re done.

If you run out of space here, items will start to automatically go into your regular inventory.  Items can be moved back and forth between the two types of personal storage areas by right-clicking on them.

Finally, no discussion of Crafting Storage would be complete without mentioning the Mail System.  :p

All tradeable items can be sent back and forth between alts (alternate characters on your account) and friends, then left in your mailbox unopened for a good deal of time.  Proper mailbox use can extend your personal storage space for tradeable items infinitely.

Selecting your Crafting and Gathering Professions

As a new player, your first exposure to Crafting trainers comes in Chapter 2 of the WAR Story.  (The PvE towns in WAR are designated as Chapters and the PvE road moves you through these Chapters in sequential order.)  If you are on a Trial Account, this is the only place you can learn these professions.

Those players with subscriptions to WAR can also train in their Capital City (Altdorf or the Inevitible City).

It costs no money to train or re-train a Crafting profession.  You can change your profession at any time, however you will lose all progress you have made in that profession.

The Apothecary, Cultivator and Hedge Wizard (Talisman Making) trainers also are Merchants selling items for their respective craft.

Once you’ve made your choice, it’s time to level your profession(s).  For the sake of this guide, let’s assume you’ve made Butchering your Gathering profession and Apothecary your Crafting profession.

Butchering Overview

Butchering is just what it sounds like: chopping up “animals” to get ingredients to make potions with.

Butchering is what I refer to as a “pure” Gathering profession in that there is just one real stage to it.  Once an animal is dead, you butcher it and loot the ingredients.  No other work is required.

Butchering has just had a revamp that has made it far more viable as a Gathering profession to use with Apothecary.  It’s not as RvR-friendly as Cultivating though as you are not able to butcher players.  You can butcher their pets though, so you do occasionally get something in RvR, it’s just not a viable way to gain ingredients.

Butchering is very much a “farming” profession.  Whether you’re solo or with friends, you’ll really have to have the patience and endurance to kill hundreds, if not thousands, of animals repeatedly to really mass-produce what you want.  That being said, there are lots of areas one can solo-kill creatures in large amounts (example:  Public Quests, Land of the Dead, etc).

Note:  Because Butchering is a “farming” profession, it’s also a great source of income.  The loot you receive from the monsters, as well as excess ingredients you don’t need, can be sold to either NPC Merchants or other players to make money.

Good butchers are very knowledgeable about their craft.  They have to be since different animals drop different ingredients.  Knowing which drops what and where the best places to farm are almost trade secrets of butchering, albeit ones many are willing to share due to the perseverance required to truly dominate the butchering market.

Lastly, Butchering provides the Pigments required to make some much-sought-after Dyes: six of the Dark series of Dyes.  Previously, these were only available one at a time from certain quests, so these are a very welcome addition to the profession.

Must-Have Addons for Butchering

There really is only one Addon you need to have for Butchering:  Crafting Info Tooltip.

To be honest, it’s a must-have for all Crafting/Gathering professions.  It’s just that good.

Why?  Because it shows you the “hidden” crafting information for each item when you hover over them in your inventory.  This is invaluable information for all crafters, especially when you want to make very specific things and at maximum potency.  Understanding the information it provides is the key to being a great crafter.

Go to Curse.com and do a search for this Addon and download it.  I prefer to manually install all my Addons.  It’s not difficult.  However, if you’d rather not, you can use the Curse Client instead.  (I’m not a fan as it’s always had issues on Patch Day when the new versions of addons come out and the old ones don’t always work.)

Leveling Butchering

Once you’ve trained the Butchering profession and have your Addon downloaded and in the right folder, it’s time to go out and kill some stuff!

Really.  It’s that easy.

Note:  Make sure the animal’s level is close to your own.  You can level off animals up to five levels below you, however keeping the level at or above your own will also get you more regular experience to help you level your Rank along with Butcherings.  Killing things far weaker than you doesn’t help you level, but it will still provide you with ingredients, just ones appropriate to that level.

Once you’ve got your animal good and dead, loot it completely.  Once done, you’ll see flies appear over the dead body (if it’s butcher-able that is).  The animation makes it really easy to see if what you’re killing is something you can butcher.

Move your cursor over the dead body and it will turn into a meat cleaver.  hehe.  Right-Click to butcher it and be sure to loot it all.  Certain creatures will even allow you to butcher them multiple times now which makes it both easier to level as well as easier to obtain large amounts of ingredients since it now requires fewer kills.

Once you’ve taken everything you can from the body, it disappears completely.

One thing to keep in mind is that leveling Butchering will be a slow process if you’re truly picking it up as a new player in Tier 1.  This is because your skill raises based on the level of creatures you’re killing/butchering.  You won’t reach 200 Butchering without killing animals in Tier 4.

Sample Butchering Drop List

As previously stated, part of being a good Butcher is knowing which items you get where.  Here’s a small list to help you on your way!

• Bats – Force Shield and Restoration ingredients
• Bears – Strength and Invigoration ingredients
• Birds – Ballistic Skill and Glue Bomb ingredients
• Boars – Restoration and Strength ingredients
• Canines – Invigoration and Willpower ingredients
• Daemon Beasts – Resist potion ingredients
• Dragons – Toughness and Molotov ingredients
• Felines – Willpower and Ballistic Skill ingredients
• Insects & Arachnids – Armor and Toughness ingredients
• Magical Beasts – Healing and Thorn ingredients
• Reptiles – Molotov and Thorn ingredients
• Rodents – Glue Bomb and Intelligence ingredients
• Squigs – Healing and Intelligence ingredients

Advanced Butchering

Once you’ve leveled your Butchering skill to 200, you’re ready to learn more!

The best thing to do is to go to the following web sites and read up on the information they have to offer.  They are also places you can ask for more information on things that you aren’t sure about.

Also, don’t forget to use your in-game Advice channel as well!

Official Forums for Butchering

Warhammer Alliance Forums for Butchering

In an exercise designed to satiate a whiff of whimsy, I wanted to plot out an entire year of MMORPG gaming, where each month a player would hypothetically play a different title for free, paying $0 for their year’s experience.   What would I recommend starting with December?  Hang on to my every word, faithful readers, and let’s see:

December 2009 – For the Yuletide season, I’m going to recommend an old favorite of mine, Dungeon Runners, a sort-of snarky Diablo clone that enjoyed exaggerating and mocking RPG conventions while feeding your desire for mayhem and loot frenzy.  Since the title is being shut down on January 1, 2010 (with a nuclear explosion, as a matter of fact), this is the absolute last month to play it, and perhaps the best — they’re really jacking up the loot drops and XP rewards for DR’s final weeks.

January 2010 – Why not use the first month of the new decade to reconnect with a MMO of yore?  Anarchy Online has been running free-to-play for a couple years now (although with certain limitations if you don’t subscribe).  It may not have the glitz and glamour of more modern MMOs, but it’s one of the only “old school” titles that let people tromp around for nothing!

February 2010 – Assuming that Chronicles of Spellborn is still in “redevelopment”, or whatever that means, you can play this recent title for absolutely nothing — and that includes the full game!  Of course, there’s the very real chance that some day they might pull the plug or wipe the servers, but it’s a small price to pay for free fun.

March 2010 – Get your Harry Potter on by signing up for Wizard101, the acclaimed title that mixes together turn-based combat and bright wizardy venues.  They have an unlimited free trial that certainly gives you a nice big chunk of the early game, which took my wife and I a few weeks to run through earlier this year.

April 2010 – Warhammer Online’s “endless trial” is next up for your gaming pleasure — the full Tier 1 experience, with 24 classes, PvE and PvP is yours for the taking.  If you’re willing to roll up a few alts, then this will more than meet a full month’s worth of fun.

May 2010 – Ever since switching to its hybrid free-to-play/microtransactions/subscription model, Dungeons & Dragons Online has earned the title of the best free MMO you can get your grubby mitts on.  It comes highly recommended from myself, and the free content is quite expansive, certainly more than a month’s worth.

June 2010 – Cute little Asian MMOs that are funded entirely through microtransactions might not be your thing (and they certainly aren’t mine), but Maple Story is one of the best and most beloved if it is.  So enlarge your eyes to 500% of their normal size, color your hair bright blue, and embrace 2D zaniness.

July 2010 – An Adventurer Is You!  Or so proclaims the folks over at the long-running Kingdom of Loathing, one of the wittiest browser-based MMOs in the world.  There’s no catch on the cost (players who want to support the game can purchase special items in the shop), and the wordy game has enraptured many a soul — including mine.

August 2010 – We’ll assume that by next August, Allods Online will have left beta and gone into full launch, in which case you might already have heard the siren’s call to play it.  It’s been getting excellent press so far, and for a free to play title, why not give it a whirl in the dog days of summer?

September 2010 – Many a MMORPG player has cut their teeth on Runescape, the free to play browser MMO that showed how far the limits of Java could go.  It might not be the most polished or good-looking title, but it’s had a number of overhauls and revamps, and hey — it’s light on the wallet.

October 2010 – Speaking of runes, Runes of Magic bowled a lot of people over in 2009 as both a decent WoW clone and an excellent free to play title.  They’ve already released their first expansion (also free), and you could certainly do a lot worse than give this a try, particularly if you are a current or former WoWhead.

November 2010 – Sword of the New World is one of those odd little MMO cult hits that you know, intellectually, are better than the rest of the pack, but may have yet to ever give it a whirl.  So why not, in this last month of our hypothetical experiment, do just that?

I’d like to ask you a serious question. How hard can it be to take a keep with a warband and no defenders? Let me answer on your behalf. Bloody hard, if last nights pitiful attempt at taking 3 keeps in Tier 2 on Karak Norn, is anything to go by. I’m surrounded by idiots. Maybe that’s a bit harsh, maybe it’s just a couple who are wielding their god given stupidity like a two-handed axe. Lets list a couple of my favourite ones from the evening.

1. Pets not being on passive within the keep and pulling the Lord.

2. Walking past the lord hall on an elf keep, in such a manner as to pull the lord and all the guards. I grant you, that’s actually easy to do with the elf keeps and their narrow walkway around the edge of the lords room.

3. Warband leader not picking a MA. So no real focus fire happening.

4. People not listening to the warband leader.

5. Using AOE abilities in situations not conducive to AOE.

6. People moaning about people being noobs, without educating them as to why their not being to helpful at the moment. This one really annoys me, when people do this. This is hardly going to get people to embrace the game, if you make them feel like idiots.

EDIT 7. Why aren’t we getting heals/rezes quicker = Only 2 healers in the warband. The number of people who don’t do a healer count prior to coming out with this statement. Again this one came out that night. I’m a bit disappointed I forgot this little gem.

And yes before you ask, by the start of the 2nd keep I asked people to beware their use of AOE and pet agro.

As you can imagine, it was a less than satisfying evening, which by the end had me dreading my next 24 character levels.

To top off this week so far, I was chewing through a pack of Rowntrees hard gums while watching 2012 and cracked a large piece off one of my molars. I can already imagine that the ensuing pain at the dentists will far surpass those 3 failed keep takes. If you can afford to wait, catch 2012 on DVD/BluRay, that will be less painful as well.

Mood = Very Depressed.

With the flood of new Trial Accounts in WAR due to the new “Endless Trial”, there has also come a flood of questions in Region and Advice about all aspects of WAR.

Now, while basic information for just about every aspect of WAR can be found online if one goes and looks for it, it is very rarely all found in one spot.

I hate that.  I love one-stop-shopping.

Soooo…here is the first of a series of “Beginner’s Guides” for WAR:  Cultivation.

Enjoy!

~Gaar

Quick Explanation of Crafting in WAR

WAR has a two-stage crafting system.  The first stage is handled through a “gathering” profession and the second stage is the actual “crafting” profession.

Here’s the rundown:

Apothecary - Crafting Profession – Makes potions with various temporary effects.

• Butchering - Gathering Profession – Harvests monsters for items to use in making potions.
• Cultivation - Gathering Profession – Grows plants and fungi to use in making potions.

Talisman Making – Crafting Profession – Makes talismans that can be added to worn items to boost stats.

• Magical Salvaging - Gathering Profession – Deconstructs items for the parts to use in making talismans.
• Scavenging - Gathering Profession – Harvests players/NPCs for items to use in making talismans.

At the time this guide was created, all Gathering professions were viable for use in each of their respective Crafting professions.  However, each Crafting profession has its own pros and cons, as does each gathering profession.  It is best to understand those pros/cons before selecting your professions, however you are able to change both your Crafting and Gathering profession at any time (however at the loss of all progress).

Crafting Storage

Most of the items you will use in your crafting will be tradeable, thus can be stored not just in your own inventory, but also your Personal Bank Vault and your Guild Bank Vault.  The exception to this rule currently are the Hybrid Seeds that are looted in Tier 4.

You have two options now for storing them in your personal inventory though.  Crafting items will automatically (upon purchase/loot) go to your Crafting Item Inventory.  This is the third tab of your Backpack as shown in the picture below.

This special inventory space starts with only one bag, but you gain more bags by leveling your crafting professions.  You gain a new bag for each 100 points you earn in each profession, giving you a total of five bags when you’re done.

If you run out of space here, items will start to automatically go into your regular inventory.  Items can be moved back and forth between the two types of personal storage areas by right-clicking on them.

Finally, no discussion of Crafting Storage would be complete without mentioning the Mail System.  :p

All tradeable items can be sent back and forth between alts (alternate characters on your account) and friends, then left in your mailbox unopened for a good deal of time.  Proper mailbox use can extend your personal storage space for tradeable items infinitely.

Selecting your Crafting and Gathering Professions

As a new player, your first exposure to Crafting trainers comes in Chapter 2 of the WAR Story.  (The PvE towns in WAR are designated as Chapters and the PvE road moves you through these Chapters in sequential order.)  If you are on a Trial Account, this is the only place you can learn these professions.

Those players with subscriptions to WAR can also train in their Capital City (Altdorf or the Inevitible City).

It costs no money to train or re-train a Crafting profession.  You can change your profession at any time, however you will lose all progress you have made in that profession.

The Apothecary, Cultivator and Hedge Wizard (Talisman Making) trainers also are Merchants selling items for their respective craft.

Once you’ve made your choice, it’s time to level your profession(s).  For the sake of this guide, let’s assume you’ve made Cultivation your Gathering profession and Apothecary your Crafting profession.

Cultivation Overview

Cultivation is just what it sounds like:  the growing of plants/fungi to produce ingredients for making potions.

Despite being classified as a “Gathering” profession, Cultivation is very much like a “Crafting” profession.  You start with one type of item, add things to it, and end up with an entirely new item.  However, because the item you create is a sub-component used in an actual “Crafting” profession, it remains just a unique form of “Gathering” profession.

Cultivation is a very popular Gathering profession because it can be done anywhere and at any time.  You can even do it while in the middle of RvR or while completing a Dungeon.  Despite Cultivating taking “time” to do, it’s ability to be done constantly makes it the most time-efficient of the Gathering professions.

Cultivation has the possiblity to be a very, very space intensive profession.  There are sixteen “basic” seeds and twelve Hybrid seeds.  The basic seeds have different versions for levels 1, 25, 50, 75, 100, 125, 150, 175 and 200.  If you choose to just keep the level 200 seeds, you’ll need 28 slots just for stacks of seeds.  If you choose to keep all levels, you’ll need 156 slots for stacks of seeds.  That’s where good space-management comes in.  If you don’t craft for your entire Guild, the Auction House,  and/or alts, just keep the level 200s and you’ll be fine.  Additionally, you can just keep the seeds for the potions you use and get rid of the rest as well.  (I suggest mail storage or using an alt, but that’s just me.)

As an added bonus, Cultivation has a chance to also produce Pigments used to create certain Dyes for your armor.  At this time though, Butchering has access to Pigments that produce the harder-to-find Dyes whereas Cultivation’s Pigments aren’t as sought after.

Plots and Stages

To start Cultivating, go to your Abilities menu, click the General tab on the far right and drag the Cultivating icon to your toolbar.  Once there, press it to open the Cultivating window.

As a brand-new Cultivator, you will have access to two of your four available plots.  As you level, you will unlock more plots to use which not only provides you with more resources, but also speeds up your leveling!

Each plot has four spots for adding items.  The main one is for your seed/spore.  The other three are for your Additives. There are three kinds of Additives: Soil, Watering Can, and Nutrient.  The Additives are adding during specific Stages of the cultivation process.

The first Stage is Germination where Soil can be added.  Soil both reduces the time it takes to grow your seed/spore as well as giving you a bonus to your Critical Chance when cultivating.

The second Stage is Seedling where Watering Can can be added.  Watering Cans reduce both the time it takes to grow your seed/spore as well as giving you a bonus to your Special Chance when cultivating.

The third Stage is Flowering where Nutrient can be added.  Nutrients reduce both the time it takes to grow your seed/spore as well as reducing your chance to fail.

Once all those stages are done, you can now Harvest your grown plant/fungus.

Note:  The Uproot button.  Yes, it’s there.  No, you have no reason to ever use it.  So don’t.

Second Note:  You really don’t need to use Additives at all.  Sure, they can speed up your growth and leveling, but ultimately they’re not needed.  If you’re in a hurry and have excess money, go for it.  If not, just pop the seed in and go back to whatever you were doing.

Must-Have Addons for Cultivation

There are two must-have Addons as a cultivator: Crafting Info Tooltip and Miracle Grow Remix.

These two Addons will not only make your life easier, they’ll make you love Cultivating since it will become so very, very easy.

I’ll explain why you want Miracle Grow Remix in a later section, but I’ll pause here for a moment to talk about Crafting Info Tooltip.

To be honest, it’s a must-have for all Crafting/Gathering professions.  It’s just that good.

Why?  Because it shows you the “hidden” crafting information for each item when you hover over them in your inventory.  This is invaluable information for all crafters, especially when you want to make very specific things and at maximum potency.  Understanding the information it provides is the key to being a great crafter.

Go to Curse.com and do a search for both of these and download them.  I prefer to manually install all my Addons.  It’s not difficult.  However, if you’d rather not, you can use the Curse Client instead.  (I’m not a fan as it’s always had issues on Patch Day when the new versions of addons come out and the old ones don’t always work.)

I’m going to assume you downloaded them for the rest of the guide because, frankly, you should.  Consider it a requirement.  They’re THAT good.

Stocking up on Seeds

Hands down the easiest way to get the full stock of your sixteen basic seeds is to just buy them from the guy that just trained you.  They sell for between 1-2 silver a piece.  Usually buying 3-4 of each is more than enough as you’ll make more during the cultivation process.

Alternately, you can buy them from other Tier 1 Merchants.  Same price, same idea.

If you really don’t want to buy the seeds, you may be in the wrong profession.  hehe.  However, there is one route left to you.  In each Tier there is a wandering quest-giver that will give you a repeatable quest for one type of seed.  You won’t get your full spectrum of seeds this way, but it’s free and you can level this way and then beg/buy the level 200s you want later.

Leveling Cultivation

Once you have at least one Seed/Spore (and your Addons!), you’re ready to level Cultivation.

Before starting, if you can’t see your Miracle Grow window, type /mg show.  Once you see it, right-click on it and choose Configure.  Slide down the first page to the “Automatic Reaping” heading, check the box to reserve seeds and set it to how many you have.  (When leveling, I tend to keep mine at 4.  Just make sure it’s more than 2 as you can fail and lose your seeds easily.)  Once done, hit Apply and close the window.

Using your Miracle Grow window, click the left box and select the seed/spore you want and then do it again for your second plot.

Once the plant is grown, Miracle Grow will flash for you to let you know to restart it.  Click the far-right buttons for each plot to just re-grow your last type of seed.

As you level, you’ll get different items from the Harvest process based on what happens.

• A regular Harvest will get you two of the plant/fungus you were trying to grow.
• A Critical Success upon Harvest will get you three of the plant/fungus you were trying to grow.
• A Critical Failure upon Harvest will get you a Wilted Weed which is junk.
• A Special Moment upon Harvest will get you three of the plant/fungus you were trying to grow, 1 of the plant/fungus a level above it and one Pigment for making Dyes.

Now, what’s happening behind the scenes here needs to be understood.  Miracle Grow is doing multiple things for you automatically.  It’s managing the Stages of growth, Harvesting your items, Reaping your items to maintain your seed/spore count, and then re-planting to continue your leveling.  Of these things, Reaping is what we haven’t discussed but is incredibly important.

Reaping is normally done by Control-Right-Clicking the plant/fungus.  What it does is it breaks that item down into a seed/spore of that type while also producing a Resin.  This is important for three reasons.  First, it’s an almost limitless source of seeds of the same level for you.  Second, Resins are used in the Apothecary process as a Stabilizer.  Third, and most important for leveling, it allows you to Reap the plants of the next higher level that you receive from Special moments.  This is how you get your higher level seeds to continue the leveling process.

As you obtain the next level of plants/fungi, Reap them for the seeds/spores you need to keep leveling and just keep repeating this process until you hit 200 skill in Cultivation.

Advanced Cultivation

Once you’ve leveled your Cultivation skill to 200, you’re ready to learn more!

The best thing to do is to go to the following web sites and read up on the information they have to offer.  They are also places you can ask for more information on things that you aren’t sure about.

Also, don’t forget to use your in-game Advice channel as well!

Official Forums for Cultivation

Warhammer Alliance Forums for Cultivation

Short background: To lock any zone you either need Domination Points by holding all Objectives for a certain amount of time (Keeps 2 hours, BOs 30 minutes) or you can Victory Point Lock by having a proper set of victories in 4 fields (Objectives, Scenarios, PvE, and Previous Zone). Up until scenarios were fixed, Victory Point Locks were fairly rare. But now with them active again, we have a new problem. That problem is centered around queues and short-term goals.

Ultimately, locking a zone takes coordination and time, in either lock type. Building Objective Points towards the VP Lock is a simple as taking the objectives. But building Points in Scenarios requires wins in scenario instances. If those aren’t popping, you can still queue up for the scenario(s) and build points in that area, slowly by each person, but still build them. This ends VP Lock 101 (obvious to all). Now for 102 (obvious to few, apparently).

**The usual result of Domination Locks; You go to get a drink in your boredom and your cat screws up your UI while your gone. You come back to an unfimilar screen as you hear on Vent your group screaming for heals. Too bad you can’t help them, cause you put all your eggs into a Domi-Lock let your guard down and you found out your evil cat works for Destro.**

The problem with queueing for scenarios is you may just be doing it to build the points. But you and your WB have no intention of taking the pop if it were to so occur. Mainly because you are queued to just build points in hopes of a VP lock, but aren’t willing to risk losing the better chance of getting a Domination lock. IE, VP would nice, but Domi is better to ensure.

So here you are, you have 2 WB about Dragonwake and so far you having been shutting down all attempts for the opposing side to take a BO from you. Unfortunately you still have 30 minutes to wait and the VPs are at 62. Suddenly you see an order for all WB assistants to queue their groups. Also you see message to not take the pop if it does. This could result in a negative effect. Because you may not have any intention of taking the queue pop but the opposers Premade does. All they have to do is queue; take the pop; and even without an opposing population in the scenario, they only have to get 1 point to win the Scenario and earn 25% in SCs for their VPs.

Suddenly that 62 VP you once had, goes to 59. And so on if you keep doing it. One win for them negates the points you were building by queueing. The SC points for VPs was set in place to build for those that queue as a counter to keeping a VP locks blocked by the opposing army refusing scenarios. It wasn’t set up to just give free points. If you don’t take the pop, you are giving free VPs to the other side, and solidifying the probability of not having a VP lock at all.

The counter plan to this is to organize in such a fashion that 2 premade groups are assigned as SC group. Their job, to take SCs. When not in one, they sit in the middle of the RvR pool and run to areas that need assistance. They should be separate from the WBs that are assembled for the defense fo the Domination Lock. Once these 2 (or more) groups are established they announce that they are queueing, once completed everyone else (defense WBs) can queue. This allows for more SC points to develope. If the SC pops, the first queuers (premade groups) will be given the pops first, and once in, they announce and all defenders un-queue.

Once the premades exit the SCs, they re-queue and the process above starts all over again. This will always make sure you not only develope SC points, but that you ready to respond when an SC actually pops. 2 groups are recommended. Saying the SC is one that normally runs 3 to 4 groups, then those 2 groups need to call for reinforcements in /1 Region and the WB leaders need to decide if they can spare one (or two) groups to go in the SC with premades or if they can spare one person from each group, so that the lose in troops on the field is equilateral.

By using the above strategy you can rapidly respond to defenses in the pool and also ensure better results in your VP Locks. The better you ensure VP Locks the bigger your WBs will grow and the better moral you will have for your faction in continuing to push the cities. Sitting about always trying to Domination Lock is a good way to lose troops. This type of “sound” strategy causes massive frustration as soon as a slight error occurs and puts a halt to any further progress your armies can make that day. Pushing for VP locks is essential, but performing that task has an important role in what procedure you choose. Too often simply forcing group leaders to queue everyone results in a negative result in opposition to what was intended. And this needs to stop.

Not a leader, just a guy who judges yours,

Knowledge is the most important thing, of course, but there are other features Blizzard could add to the game that would help roleplayers too. I’d like to address a few of these things, and see how much they could really do for us.

All the World’s a Stage: Player housing, interactivity, and other possible features

Warhammer Online now has a “perpetual” free trial.  It joins the ranks of Wizard 101, Free Realms (which is now almost just like WAR, albeit having arrived from a different direction), Guild Wars, DDO and Puzzle Pirates in the short list of games that I think are starting to understand the market.  Of course, Guild Wars is still the frontrunner in the business model department, and Puzzle Pirates will likely remain the one I play most (it’s just so durn schedule friendly!), but this change by the WAR crew is exactly the tipping point that has me itching to download the game.

If it turns out well, I might even give them some money, like I did for W101 and Puzzle Pirates.  In the immortal words of Daniel James of Puzzle Pirates fame:

Money can’t buy you love, but love can bring you money. In software the only sustainable way to earn money is by first creating love, and then hoping that some folks want to demonstrate that love with their dollars.

I want to like WAR. I’ve been digging into the tabletop game, and it’s fascinating.  While there are some considerable differences, WAR looks interesting enough to take a look, and Public Quests look interesting as a mechanic.  They have offered me (and many others) a gift by changing their business model this way.  Time will tell if I love them enough to demonstrate it with dollars.  The chance of that went up from 0% to at least 33%, and that has to count for something.  Even marketers understand that math.

Of course, dearest Turbine and Blizzard, if either of you wanted to up the ante by offering me a lifetime sub to LOTRO or WoW for my birthday, I’d not turn you down.  I’d even promise to take lots of pretty screenshots and write about what you are doing right in your games.  (The records show that I’ve done plenty of complaining, so I can afford to balance it out.)

It is my birthday, after all, and turning up my nose at gifts would just be… improper.

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Disclosure:  I know, I know, some would say that WAR is dying and should be taken out back and dumped on the Tabula Rasa heap.  Some might suggest I give money to someone more deserving.  There are definitely (largish) grains of truth in those opinions.

WAR will never be my “main” MMO.  Still, this is a Good Move for the business of MMOs, and hopefully a good one for WAR, and I want to let these people know that I approve.  If they don’t read my blog (slackers!), maybe I can send them a birthday card with a nice $10 bill or something.  Since, y’know, we’re supposed to vote with our wallet.

And, well… I’ve spent my fair share of money buying games that aren’t the biggest boys on the block, and that aren’t the greatest examples of game design.  Yet… they are fun enough to warrant an expenditure on my part as a reward for a job well done.  Call it my way of paying the tab after a decent, middle class night out to eat.  It’s not The Ritz, but it’s not Carl’s Jr.  I’m totally happy paying game devs for their work, I just want to do it on my terms.  That will never be paying for a subscription.

Heck, I even gave Braid $5.  If I can do that, I can lob some dollar love at the WAR guys.  Well, that is if their gift really is a fun bit of work, not something I’m going to send along as a White Elephant to someone else in a week…  and $10 is half of Torchlight or Machinarium…

Yeah, Mythic’s had a pretty rocky past week, and many have cast doubts on the future of WAR (smart money says that it’s here to stay for quite some time).  But while I might not be returning to WAR anytime soon, the more I’m reading about their Endless Trial program, the more I think that if I wasn’t a longtime vet of Warhammer, I would leap on board this in an instant.  Why?

1. It’s free.  Let’s repeat — free.  We like free.  Free costs nothing.  Free gameplay?  Score.  We are a culture that certainly likes to “try before buy”, and for a MMORPG trial, it doesn’t get much better than this.
2. It’s also endless, provided you’re okay with the limitations (level 10, tier 1 cap, no auction house postings, empire vs. chaos zones only).  There’s no 14/7-day rush to experience a the game — you can install this on your computer and browse through it at your leisure.
3. Tier 1 was always some of the most fun I ever had in that game.  Awesome scenarios, fun PQs, and fast-paced leveling always got the thumb’s up from me.
4. You might be restricted to a certain starting zone, but it looks as though you can enjoy any of the game’s 24 classes — so if you pace yourself and try them all, that’s 240 levels of content at your disposal.
5. If you’ve played WAR in the past, Mythic’s done a lot of changes, tweakings and rearrangements for their new player experience, which is not-so-coincidentally covered by this trial.
6. Because both new subscriber players and all trial players are forced to start in these zones, you can expect a LOT of PvP and PQ action.
7. The PvP is actually quite fun in tier 1.  Probably the most fun of any tier I experienced.  You don’t have a lot (or any) CC yet, so inexperienced players have a higher survival rate than if they were thrust into a tier 4 situation.
8. There’s quite a few Tome unlocks in Tier 1 to keep a PvE player quite happy — items, titles and more, for your taking!
9. The trial has a much quicker download than the full client, getting you in the game faster.
10. WAR’s been out for over a year — and all MMOs benefit from that first year’s worth of additional development, refinement and content additions.

Have you recently been given a rez through a keep door?

I have accidently discovered the secret. And to my credit, all on my own. And no, not with a hack. It’s due in fact to lag and healer mods from the Curse.com clients and probably mostly because of the ‘performance’ upgrades of 1.3.2. How do you do this? Why can you do this? And should you do this?

Most importantly, how the hell can I (cough, I mean you) do this. Well, firstly, I am sure as a healer you are using Curse to give you a mod like Squared. If you are not, go shot yourself and reroll. Squared is a mod (for those of you that are not healers) that better displays health of everyone in your Warband and makes choosing worthy friendlies to heal, that much easier. Furthermore, using a mod like ISHealBot allows you to assign abilities to your clicking on friendly squares.

For example, a friendly is taking heavy damage. Without any mods you would have to click on them, either by the list on the left or by physically in your sights. Then you have to apply your healing abilities by clicking the abilities or by hitting your hot buttons numerically to activate them. There is alot of time wasted in performing these actions. To be one of the better healers, you need help. With mods like ‘IsHealBot’ you can assign the basic HoT to just basic clicking. Meaning just clicking the person in ‘Squared’ will allow you to instantly cast the HoT right when you click. That would allow you to apply a single HoT to everyone in your WB as quick as you can click. If you think about how fast you can click, that is some fast healing. Prepare to lose AP/RF quick if you aren’t careful.

Furthermore you can assign more abilities to ISHealBot by having a conditional key, like CTRL or SHIFT or ALT, or combination of those with a click on a Square. So if you are like me, you have the basic HoT on regular click, your basic instant heal on CTRL click, and Rez on SHIFT click.

Now, abilities start a cast and take the cost of AP/RF before it checks for pass/fail. If you try cast a HoT on someone 200 feet from you, that doesn’t stop the ability from taking 20 AP from you and then failing. There is a great benefit to using these mods, but also room for negative results on failures by just ignorantly clicking about. Now if it is something without a cast time (like the basic HoT), the system checks for the pass/fail, cast the ability, and when errors occur it refunds the points spent. However, in the case of abilities with cast, you are not refunded the AP for the failed cast. So in heavy combat like a Keep for instance, you can throw a cast on someone with this mod and possibly get the cast off before the system realizes you don’t have LOS, or within Range, since you can start a cast before it checks for pass/fail. In the case of heavy cast times, like rezes, you can possibly beat out the collision detection (pass/fail) and cast a rez on someone on the otherside of the door before the system realizes that shouldn’t be possible. In many cases, the error message will pop up, but too late as the cast already made it to the end of the 2 seconds and the rez is accepted. You essentially preformed a LOS exploit.

Is it my fault though? I’m not sure it’s my fault that Mythic encourages Mods and helps these mods. So I don’t think the mods are illegal, they aren’t third party programs in my background. Is it my fault as well that I didn’t realize the rez or heal intended is not in LOS (Line of Sight)? Before I went through to test to see what was happening, I went weeks without knowing I was doing it. Really, the reason this can happen is Mythic to better improve server performance must have given ability cast priority over collision detection. So though the action is tested for pass/fail, it is not immediate, therefore allowing, by accident or not, the ability to wall/obstacle heal cast.

My concern is that I don’t feel I’m hacking or exploiting on purpose, but it could be seen that way. I recognize that I can now do things beyond the intention of the game, but I’m not hacking. How close am I to the line of exploiting? Am I being watched by John Cox? I’ve reported it through feedback and the fact that I am doing it if they want to watch me to see. I like the mods and my intention here in reporting myself is that I want the exploit possibility fixed. Without those two mods, I’m not sure I could keep playing my healers. My new found ability to heal through a wall, or rez you through the door is not really one I want. I just like my mods and the ease of being a well noticed healer inside of my WB.

Now, before you walk away from this article thinking “I need to do that” or constantly fill your ventrilos with “Freakin wall hackin Shammy.” This borderline exploit is just that, borderline. Why? Because it only works under heavy collisions (lag) and few out of multiple tries. To rez someone through the door, averages about 3 tries from my findings. Each time you tried you had to pay the AP/RF for each, they don’t get refunded. So in a way, you are paying 3 times the normal cast times and AP to rez someone, on average. Same for heals that have cast times. This is normally what the combat log would look like:

00:00:00 Casting Breath of Sigmar on Captmoronbangsonram cost 20 RF
00:01:00 You cannot see your target
00:01:00 Breath of Sigmar Failed
00:02:00 Casting Breath of Sigmar on Captmoronbangsonram cost 20 RF
00:03:30 You cannot see your target
00:03:30 Breath of Sigmar Failed
00:04:30 Casting Breath of Sigmar on Captmoronbangsonram cost 20 RF
00:06:30 You cannot see your target
00:08:00 Captmoronbangsonram has accepted your resurrection.

On the third try I will still get the error, but the cast was already sent by the time it realized it failed after 2 seconds. Now weighing the benefit of this, is hard. It cost a dedicated 6 and half seconds of a healer’s time and then another 60 Rightess Fury. Pretty heavy prices for a rez. Now, if I had a helper healer in the group, didn’t have to worry about everyone whiping and I have nothing better to do then rez Captmoron, then not so much. How often do you have that benefit? Hence the title ‘Borderline.’

See, you can learn something from my rants sometimes.

Regards you hackers,

A post in which I draw two points and declare there to be a line.

Before I start, I just want to point out the humor tag on this post.  Some people will miss that and not read the post in the spirit in which it was written.  It is Friday.  Relax and just chuckle at my folly.

I have a theory about fishing and fantasy MMORPGs.

Fishing Yet Again

I believe that there is a correlation between how well a fantasy MMORPG does relative to its contemporary competitors and how deep and interesting the fishing mechanism that is available at launch.

So, the better the fishing is at launch, the better the game will do relative to other games that launch in a similar window of time.

My data set so far:

EverQuest: Launched March 1999

Fishing: A relatively straightforward but deep fishing mechanism.  You needed a fishing pole which had to be equipped.  You needed bait, which got used up as you fished.  You could fish in just about any water you could find.  And you caught a wide variety of things, from fish that could be used for cooking, to rusty weapons that could be sharpened, to junk for the vendor.  So in many ways very much like real fishing; pick your spot, grab your pole, make sure you have bait, and fish away.

Market position: Rapidly became the king of the hill, declining only when the next generation of competitors came along.

EverQuest II: Launched November 2004

Fishing: Barely a fishing mechanism at all.  No fishing pole or bait required.  Fishing was reduced to harvesting “fish nodes” which at launch would yield at most a single fish per try before the fisherman had to move on to the next node, so you were constantly on the run.  And then all you ever caught was fish, never the stereotypical old boot or rusty dagger.

Market position: A strong start that rapidly faded with the game never achieving anything close to the popularity of its predecessor.

Lord of the Rings Online: Launched April 2007

Fishing: None at launch, added later (too late by my theory)

Market position:  Mid-pack, never a contender for market leadership.

Warhammer Online: Launched September 2008

Fishing: None

Market position: Mid-pack after losing more than half of their early subscriber base

The Wild Card

Now, the whole in my data set is World of Warcraft, but only because I did not play on day one so I cannot speak personally to the state of fishing back then.  But from what I have seen since I started playing five months after launch is that WoW has a very EverQuest-like fishing paradigm.  You need a pole.  There is no bait, but you can attach a lure.  You can fish wherever you want.

And furthermore, WoW has continued to improve fishing as time went along.  There are fishing tournaments, fishing achievements, fishing quests, some truly special fishing poles, and even some pets that you can obtain only by fishing.  You can fish up an amazing amount of things.  Plus there was that fishing chair that was in the card game.

Don't mind me, I'm just fishing

What Am I Saying?

Now at this point you may wonder if I am somehow suggesting that fishing is the most important feature of an MMORPG.

I am not.

I am moving more towards a “canary in a coal mine” view of fishing.  If a company has had the resources to deliver a reasonably polished game and has had the time to include fishing as something more than an afterthought, that the game might have the makings of a winner.

More Data Needed

Of course, to test a theory one of the things you can do is see if it would have predicted the same outcome for similar events outside of the current data set.  In this case, other MMORPGs that have launched.  I have taken two sample cases of good and bad fishing and drawn a line and then forced a couple of null set results onto that line and called it a theory.

So what other games have had fishing at launch, how good was that fishing mechanic, and how have the games done?

For example, while I wasn’t there, I am going to guess that Ultima Online had fishing of some sort.  I mean, if you could be a shepherd, how could they miss fisherman.  And while I tend to see UO as more the culmination of the long running Ultima series of games rather than a game on the D&D-Diku-EQ-WoW trajectory of MMORPGs (which isn’t a bad thing), it was the market leader in its time, it exceeded the expectations of the developer, and it lives on today.

What about Aion, Runes of Magic, or the upcoming Alganon?  Alganon certainly took a cue from WoW on interface, did they also borrow fishing?

Something on the hook

Other Questions

Should this theory include PvP oriented games or not?  I put WAR on the list because Mythic invested in a PvE game.

Is it limited to fantasy?  Did Star Wars Galaxies have fishing?  Could this have been an early indicator for the fates of Auto Assault and Tabula Rasa?

Is there another game mechanic besides fishing that fits the theory better?  I cannot bring myself to generalize this to a good resource harvesting mechanism because fishing generally represents such tangential feature to the game that I think it is special.

Or is this all just the view of somebody who has maxed out the fishing skill in every MMO he has played?

Looking to get one of the new Warhammer endless trial accounts, I went to the account management page of the WAR site and saw that my main account was eligible for a 10 day free re-trial, so long as I provided billing information ahead of time.  The deal read that as long as I canceled my subscription within the 10 day time period I would not be charged.  So what would the harm be in that? 

Logging into WAR on my 35 shaman I quickly set my UI back up to something semi-functional and tried to queue for some scenarios.  No dice.  Apparently Altdorf was being sacked and therefore T4 scenarios were all disabled.  No problem I thought to myself, I’ll just head on down to Altdorf for some RvR, and after all, they did implement some changes to the city siege that should be worth checking out.

Right.  Once I arrived at the city I saw a large group of destruction players loitering around the gates outside.  I quickly ran into the instance portal and joined Altdorf Siege instance # 1892.  I joined an open warband and was ready for action.  Sadly there were no order to be found in this instance.  The only “action” was the 30-40 destruction players that were all standing around afk on flags waiting for the 30 minute timer to count down for the capture of Altdorf to be complete.  Since I wanted to actually participate in RvR in an RvR based game, I left the instance and dropped group hoping to get a better instance. 

For anyone fortunate enough to have participated in a city siege in War, let me explain to you how the chat system works and how difficult they make it to coordinate an attack.  Instances are created based on how many attacking players are trying to participate.  These instances are all numbered but all share the same generic chat channels to coordinate attacks between different warbands (groups of up to 24 players).  So your chat will look something like this.

Pwnstar: Push the middle in 1877!

Healmort: Looking for WB invite in 1852. R40rr50 Zealot. All Superior Wards.

Someguywhoplaysagirl: stop pulling lord in 1848..ur just helping order.

Pwnstar: Fall back to the east in 1877

Jerkelite: if your not r40 with at least greater wards please leave #1852. We need geared  ppl to clear PQ boss.  

Pwnstar: Loosing temple.  Middle reinforce them.  East group send some more to middle to watch there in 1877.  My WB all to temple.

Etc…

So while I am standing around thinking of how much more enjoyable it would be actually watching grass grow, I get to receive play by play updates regarding an actual street fight progression just an instance portal away.  Lovely. 

My mind was made up to try to squeeze into an actual contested instance. 

Zone Out -> Zone back in.  Still in 1892.  Hmm.. 

Zone Out -> Log out.  Log in -> Zone back in.  Still in 1892.  Ok. 

Zone Out -> Exit Game.  Restart Game -> Log back in.  I appear back in the Green Skin Chapter One starting area.  %&*@.  Ok recall to city -> Fly to Riekland -> Ride to Altdorf Gates and zone in……  1892.  @#^&* 

Apparently I was married to an instance completely devoid of an RvR.  War is everywhere indeed.  I took stock of my options.  Based on the deciphering the chat spam I discerned that at least one instance had an actual order group fighting back and contesting the city, one had a small token force of order that was sneaking around picking off small groups and stragglers, and two were completely empty of any order opposition. 

I requested an invite to an open warband in instance #1877, hoping that perhaps I could squeeze in unnoticed.  No dice.  Either they knew I wasn’t inside the instance or they wouldn’t invite anyone under rank 40.  Lovely.  Back into #1892 I went where myself and about 30 realm mates stood around flags doing absolutely nothing for ten additional minutes while the counters ticked away. 

Destruction captured the city and the warband that I was in formed up at the Sigmar Temple to run the PQ there.  Or rather we formed up to attempt to run the PQ at that location.  The non boss NPCs went down very quickly.  The boss himself was another matter.  The majority of the warband was under 40 and thus not very well geared.  The boss has an AOE attack that hits players in range for around 80,000 hit points.  My shaman had about 7000 hit points.  

I assume that if I had taken the time to collect “wards” that perhaps I could have lived through this attack somehow.  As to why WAR needs such a harsh penalty for not following proper PVE and RvR progression given the population problems it is having is beyond me.  Why even allow so many sub max rank players attack and sack the city if they are shut out from all of this content?  Why force players to show up at the city to attack, by disabling both scenarios and the open RvR campagin, if they just zone into empty instances and PQ bosses that they have no hopes of defeating?

Robbiebit (who has yet to post here) and I were playing Dungeons & Dragons Online a few days ago and then recently (before the news) we thought to try out the unlimited trial of WAR. I have to say that for the casual MMO guy that I am, these games really fit the bill. Why is that? Perhaps a little background would help. (Feel free to skim because this turned out to be a bit longer than I anticipated)

My first stint in playing MMORPG’s was when Star Wars Galaxies came out. I was newly married and in graduate school and while the game was fun, I was more or less playing alone and mining farming resources. I decided that I really didn’t have the time or money to keep up with it and promptly sold my account on ebay. Apparently that is frowned upon but back then I had no idea. I ignored WOW when it came out because I was knee deep in graduate school and was experiencing fatherhood for the first time. Free time was at a premium here.

In 2006, my brother-in-law then told me that his buddy was setting him up with an account on Everquest and for whatever reason I decided to give it a whirl. This was the first time I had played an MMO where I actually knew someone in the game world and I was hooked instantly. I created a halfling druid named Piddleglum, but everyone just called me Pid. I was playing as frequently as possible and was having a blast. It reminded me of the times in undergrad when I played a MUD with some of my dorm mates. Life was good, but after a while the time I was spending in the game was testing my marriage (I was also unemployed at the time after graduating from graduate school) and some in game personality issues really made me reconsider my subscription. I know, this is a terribly unique experience, but bear with me.

Warhammer Online came out and I dove into that and ate it up for a while. The early game was a blast for me, but then in tier 3 I justcouldn’t drag myself to log into the game. Between the terrible performance on my computer, the lack of a coherent guild or groups, and the utter spamfest that RvR turned out to be really killed the game for me. I subbed for 3 months after the initial month, and only played for 2 of them.

During all of this time my brother-in-law was crafting a kings ransom in EQ but not really playing all that much. There was an announcement of the closing of a progression server on EQ and I misinterpreted the details of it to think that all servers were going to wipe any characters below level 10. I resubbed to EQ and then played for 5-7 months before realizing that this aging game just really didn’t appeal to me. My brother-in-law and Robbiebit were playing as much as I was and that camaraderie was awesome, but soon my B-i-L was not signing in and the game is pretty tough without a group even with the new mercenaries. I just couldn’t justify paying $15 a month for an aging game that had little to offer if you weren’t a raider or in a well established guild.

I tried my hand at Champions, but it didn’t fancy me that much. Then DDO said hey we are going F2P and now Robbiebit and I play it once a week or so. The game is tough for a duo and Robbiebit never played pen and paper D&D so he is a bit lost, but for the money, you can’t beat it. I splurged on the Drow race and Favored soul, but haven’t otherwise spent a dime on the game. We are level 4 and play when we get a chance, but not avidly. It is a win-win situation as the game is very polished and has gobs of content, but I don’t feel the need to “log-in” to get my money’s worth. Awesome!

WAR recently announced its endless free trial program and I thought, is this possibly the path for all future “failed” MMO’s? (WAR and DDO were considered failures by many.) If they can’t sustain a population that is viable through regular subscriptions, will this be a fail-safe device to at least get a little return on the investment? Only time will tell, but until then I will be casually playing DDO and waiting for the next “failure” to give a free trial out too.

-Pid

That’s the funny thing about RvR, it’s so up and down. When I originally thought to report on Laminars current progress (Solely in ORvR), I had just finished a 1.5hr session on Sunday night. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t very happy at all. I hadn’t really died a lot, I was in a group with a healer and we were just managing to hold our own (Though that’s open to interpretation).  Okay we were hemmed in on the outskirts of the warcamp in Trolls Country.

So anyways, here I am after 1.5 hrs of game play and it was pitiful, I had gained about 10% of a XP and RP level. I logged with a sinking feeling in my stomach. Damn this is going to be a monster slog to 40, doing no PvE.

Well it was a good thing I didn’t write this then, since it wouldn’t have conveyed the awesomeness of Wednesday night. I take back every crappy little thing I ever said about collision detection on your own realm, or in this case destructions (I lied I still hate it). Order were defending Mandreds Hold and after about 45 minutes of going forth and being pushed back, Destruction cracked the doors. Best news I had all night. They piled up the outer stairway of the keep and stopped just at the top, because the people at the top, had decided not to move forwards. Happy days.

There I was on the battlements of the inner keep (Where the renown trainers are), looking down on the whole of the outer stairway, it was a beautiful sight. Destruction log jammed up this stairway. It was AOE murdah, that’s all I’m going to say. No one from Destruction, ever seemed to lookup to the very top. The sum total of this, was after about 2 hrs, I had moved up about 1.5 xp and RR levels. 

It just goes to show how play sessions can contrast so much. It’s the highs and lows that only PvP, ORvR can give you.

So at the moment Laminar is level 15 and RR 13. He has acquired nearly all the tokens he needs to buy his epic armour for tier 2 and has now acquired via a golden booty bag his epic chest piece for tier 3 (Devastator).

Let me just say, Troll Country was heaving, it was soooo busy. If it’s this busy without the Endless Trial, then I hate to think what will happen when it starts in Europe. Lets hope the subscriptions really pick up and Mythic gets a chance to re employee some of the people from Monday.

My last post was quite harsh, a bit rash, and even too definite. I guess in a way, if you feel like you don’t like the game, just go try something else and then see the error in your ways. So I did. And only reinforced the fact, that what I want just doesn’t exist. And being mad about that is dumb. I can only keep daydreaming my ideas for a game. Maybe if I collected those random thoughts on hard copies, I might actually be rich one day.

Until then, I will like some of my readers be going down with the ship. I will not yet renew my subscription. As stated in one of my comments, I rather not give EA accurate numbers on what to expect.

So for the meantime I am back in WAR. I don’t know what to do about it, but I am back. Unfortunately, I get to battle in an almost completely unbalanced server. Either you play early in the day to be in the RvE Order Zerg or play at night and get steam rolled by the Destro Zerg. I think I will be testing the waters on different servers. Since I am in a such a mood to tryout new and old things. Might as well do it inside the game as well.

(baogame.vn) – Mặc dù đang nắm trong tay rất nhiều tựa game đình đám, với số lượng tiêu thụ hàng triệu bản. Tuy nhiên, trong một động thái mới nhất nhằm cải thiện doanh thu tài chính, EA đã quyết định sa thải hàng loạt nhân viên. Ngoài ra, hãng này cũng cho biết thêm là họ sẽ chỉ tập trung vào các tựa game lớn và cắt giảm ngân sách cho những dự án không khả thi.

Source: EA cắt giảm nhân lực mạnh mẽ

Now given the depressing Mythic/Warhammer news over the last couple of days, I needed something to make me laugh, preferably at the expense of another MMO. Ovron, who’s a fellow guildie provide this link to a video, with Hitler venting his rage over the mass PvP crash issue in Aion, which I know absolutely nothing about and don’t even care if it’s true, but it made me chuckle and that’s what I needed. So follow the link fellow Warhammers and have a laugh, you’ll probably need it at the moment.

If you’ve seen it already, then you’ll know what I mean. It does contain some subtitled swear words, so consider your location before you open up the link.

There are a lot of fantasy based MMOs on the market right now, but developers Fallen Earth have made the first real step out of this trend and produced an MMO based in a post-apocalyptic future – with guns and explosives the main course of the day. Will this game result in more and more sci-fi based MMOs like DUST 514?

Age of Conan, Warhammer Online, Final Fantasy XI, World of Warcraft, Guild Wars – all these MMOs share one feature; they are all based in a fantasy world of swords and spells. So it was inevitable that a developer somewhere would think to themselves, after watching something like Star Wars (coincidentally there is an Old Republic MMO coming out soon), why all the fantasy? And tada, Fallen Earth.

It looks pretty good too – they haven’t just slapped a zero on the end of the date of some old MMO, the developers really put some effort into making a very refined game with a well planned out skill base (crafting, etc) and incredible flexibility in character choice. Instead of funnelling players into specific classes and roles like the more traditional MMOs, Fallen Earth allows players to build whatever skill base they choose for a completely unique class. Someone with tanking tendencies but with a slight lean to stealth could choose to build on those specific skills, while someone else who decides to focus fully on long distance combat can put all their efforts into improving rifles and sniper training.

However, there is always going to be price to pay when bringing technology into a world previously dominated by fantasy and magic. Sadly the storyline of Fallen Earth leaves you with a rather indifferent feeling, and the themes – a virus, some nukes, world apocalypse and remnants of human civilisation – aren’t exactly ground-breaking having been explored in other genres with games like Fallout 3.

With the game only being recently released there is always the opportunity to further expand on the sci-fi genre via patches and expansions, and with more titles of a similar ilk on the way we can safely expect a deviation of the MMO niche into the world of robots and spaceships. Personally, I’m gunning for a Dune MMO – imagine going up against the Imperial Sardaukar!

Paul Park

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Yesterday was a mite bit… confusing and chaotic, following the news that EA was making major cutbacks and layoffs, especially with Mythic Entertainment.  I’ll back slowly away from restating any numbers, because there’s been enough doubt and no real official word as of yet — all we can say with certainty is that layoffs happened, and Mythic was hit with some.  Maybe a lot, maybe not.

Of course, this sent people scurrying to their keyboards to discuss the fate of Warhammer, wondering if it might be kept running but with no new significant content in the game’s future (such as, oh, an expansion).  I mean, if Age of Conan can take a similar hit to the game’s staff and reputation and still cobble together an X-pack, why not WAR?

Jeff Hickman arose from his golden sarcophagus to write a letter to Mythic players, being as comforting as he could while evading the big questions (how many are laid off?  is WAR in a “maintenance mode”? are there any content-producing devs left?).  You really can’t read much into his words, other than “It’s been a crappy day, but we’re still here, and we want you to continue to have confidence in us, because we think you should!”:

With all that is going on within Mythic Entertainment and EA, I would like to take a moment to reinforce the studio’s dedication to both our games and our players.  At Mythic, we remain committed to our games and the passionate people who play them – we’re going to continue to deliver the content and service that keeps you playing. We want to assure our community that we will maintain the same high level of customer support you’ve come to expect and continue to improve our games with an exciting schedule of patches, live events and new content.
…Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning has had a solid first year despite some issues that we’re working to address every day.  We’ve seen a great response to 1.3.2, which introduced tremendous performance improvements. A flood of new players are discovering the game every day thanks to the recently released Endless Trial and New User Journey. Moving forward we remain committed to releasing more great patches, continued performance improvements, and changes based upon your valuable feedback!

We want to thank you again for your continued commitment to our games.  In return, we remain committed to providing you with the best possible gaming experiences and customer support both now and in the future. Be sure to keep an eye open for more information about upcoming patches and the exciting plans we have in store for your favorite MMORPGs.