Warhammer Online

So Warhammer Online went life yesterday and I picked up a copy. That had been my plan for a while, though with me being guilded again in WOW I might not have the time to spend with it that I was origionally expecting.

SO, the install went ago. The patching took a while, but everything worked. Even on my Vista 64 machine, so few problems there. I picked a server where I knew at least someone, chose order b/c that's what they are and started creating the character.

The first thing I noticed, buy these characters are ulgy. Their faces just look off and everything else just looks off about them. I don't know why companies have so many problems creating attractive models for their characters, male or female, but it's always disappointing to me. The non-human characters looked much better as a result. At least they animated well.

Picking a class was simple Archmage! :) And with that it was on to the game!

First couple of quests were easy, having to adjust to the new interface was more difficult than I was expecting...I'm just too used to WOW (I had the same problem with AOC).

The next thing I noticed, the game animates smoothly like WOW does. Animation isn't jerky, you don't seem to get stuck on random flat terrain, and you don't feel like you are fighting the interface except for the camera which always seemed to reset it's default zoom level to something I didn't like.

For all the talk about how this game was different than WOW; from what I can tell it's pretty similiar. The main difference seems to be that you can go into a PVP scenario almost immediately after entering the game. You even get XP for it; and some form of PVP XP too.

So, I'd heard rumors that Destruction completely dominated in Beta; and well, last night i got first hand of that. Over the course of the night I leveled from Rank 1 to Rank 7 and did the PVP instance 13 times. The goal is simple. There are 2 Altars; when a side grabs both they get 80 points and the portals explode killing everyone near them before they reset. The first side to 500 wins. You also get a single point per kill (at least I think that's how it works on the points).

The BEST showing Order had in the 13 times I played the Scenario (got to PVP Rank 5)...we had a score of 16. Pathetic. And while you certainly seem to get rewarded more for losing, if this is the way this game is going to be I just don't see it surviving very long. There are only 2 sides, and if one side completely dominates the other from Day 1 in what is supposed to be primarily a Realm v Realm PVP game then either everyone is going to go Destruction or they are going to quit.

Personally I think this is the WOW factor. There doesn't seem to be the racial differences here that gave Horde an advantage. And I don't think it was class issue (but having not spent time with many of the quests that might be wrong). I think it's because people equate Destruction = Horde = GOOD PVP. The other major factor is, the Destruction races probably have more character. Hell, even the opening CGI movie in the game is basically Destruction kicking Order's collective ass in a completely one-sided engagement.

As for the Archmage class itself, it's a strange mix of Ranged Magic DPS and Healer. And it's fairly hard for me to control honestly. I was also having a hard time damaging things, but maybe that was because I was Rank 3 and usually running across Destruction guys which were Rank 7-11. Still, I'll probably create a Destruction character next and maybe a few other classes just to see what I like and what I don't.

Other than that, the quests were easy and generally easy to track. Much like AOC was, though the map markers could be alittle easier to deal with and it would have been nice if the active quest areas were shaded differently because the red tends to blend into the map making it hard to make out.

So, while I did have fun with the game, I also had problems. Warhammer certainly has more options from the start; but I'm very worried about it having fewer options at the end. WOW has Raids, 5-mans, PVP, specialized PVP which appeals to just about anyone. Warhammer I've been told will NOT be a raiding game, and will demphasize PVE at the cap making it less important. That leaves PVP...the thing I like least about MMOs.

So I'll have to see where this goes. Hopefully a few of my other friends will start playing as well.