http://www.warhammeralliance.com/forums/showthread.php?t=272354 this is the 1.2. preview.

Also has how GTAoE will be changed furthur down the page.

http://herald.warhammeronline.com/warherald/NewsArticle.war?id=724 this is the keep upgrade system.

The upgrades are as follows:

* Door Hit-Point Increase: Hit Points are upgraded 20% per upgrade Rank, up to 5 Ranks.
* Door Repair Merchant: An NPC that sells door-repair wood.
* Guard Numbers: More guards for your Keep by 2 guards per Rank, up to 5 Ranks.
* Patrol Guards Upgrade: Upgrades all patrolling guards to Champion-level guards.
* Static Guards Upgrade: Upgrades all stationary guards to Champion-level guards.
* Standard Merchant: An NPC that sells guild standards.
* Siege Weapon Merchant: An NPC that sells Siege Weapons.
* Healer: An NPC that cures death penalties.
* Banker: An NPC that allows players to access their Personal Vault.
* Guild Vault Keeper: An NPC that allows players to access their Guild Vault.

There are some special ones as well detailed in the link.

All looks very good!

Good to see they are fixing gtaoe without nerfing the crap out of the BW/sorc again.

When this patch will be happening?

Some small fixes but nothing really major. Not a bad idea but there is a lot more they can add to make things more fun.

Well this update is a minor one... It's not the 1.3 update yet.

Originally posted by AlexTheTall

When this patch will be happening?

I believe it is hitting the PTS next week. This is a minor patch and not really for adding content in the game, 1.3 will bring bigger changes!

Originally posted by Plaidpants

Good to see they are fixing gtaoe without nerfing the crap out of the BW/sorc again.

On the contrary, it is potentially a huge nerf every time you are in the same place as another BW.

RoF will not damage anybody who is already being hit by the effect.  To another BW casting the same spell in the same area - ie the general area of the main fight - the one who casts 2nd will not see any return  for a 10sec chanelled spell.  Seem a good idea to you when you have 6 tanks and 3 Choppas beating on your healer in a Scenario?

The problem with RoF/PoS is not in Scenario's or skirmish fights, it's is solely in Keep/Fortress takes, where there is a single choke point being targetted.  This is where  the issue lies only, and it could have been solved in other ways first, instead of pandering to the ever increasing cry babies from WoW in this game.  These same people had much success on the Blizzard forums doing exactly the same thing.

The first thing that should have been done to alleviate this issue, is making at least one other entrance ramp available in Keeps/Fortresses.  Immediately, targetted damage would be halved and these attack/defence situations would be far more fun all round.  Some of us advocated this at the very start because this type of frustration was foreseen.  Mythic suddenly recognise the problem 6 months down the line, and inform us that redesigning these structures takes 'time'.  Listen to intelligent people in the first place and all this constant re-coding wouldn't be necessary.

Every time you 'adjust' something that people have gotten used to, it is akin to deprivation.  This causes frustration, anger and resentment, and quite often the cancellation of a sub.  Not the smartest move really, is it?

Originally posted by Spaceweed10

Originally posted by Plaidpants

Good to see they are fixing gtaoe without nerfing the crap out of the BW/sorc again.

 

On the contrary, it is potentially a huge nerf every time you are in the same place as another BW.

RoF will not damage anybody who is already being hit by the effect.  To another BW casting the same spell in the same area - ie the general area of the main fight - the one who casts 2nd will not see any return  for a 10sec chanelled spell.  Seem a good idea to you when you have 6 tanks and 3 Choppas beating on your healer in a Scenario?

The problem with RoF/PoS is not in Scenario's or skirmish fights, it's is solely in Keep/Fortress takes, where there is a single choke point being targetted.  This is where  the issue lies only, and it could have been solved in other ways first, instead of pandering to the ever increasing cry babies from WoW in this game.  These same people had much success on the Blizzard forums doing exactly the same thing.

The first thing that should have been done to alleviate this issue, is making at least one other entrance ramp available in Keeps/Fortresses.  Immediately, targetted damage would be halved and these attack/defence situations would be far more fun all round.  Some of us advocated this at the very start because this type of frustration was foreseen.  Mythic suddenly recognise the problem 6 months down the line, and inform us that redesigning these structures takes 'time'.  Listen to intelligent people in the first place and all this constant re-coding wouldn't be necessary.

Every time you 'adjust' something that people have gotten used to, it is akin to deprivation.  This causes frustration, anger and resentment, and quite often the cancellation of a sub.  Not the smartest move really, is it?

 

Well then games would never get better. You'd never have expansions or content updates...because you'd be adjusting things and it would cause people to leave.

on the flip side...if this is indeed a plus...you might see more people heading back to WAR.

risk vs. reward.

I don't consider adding in a Keep upgrade system as a "Small patch".

I think you guys are asking too much of mythic to totally fix/balance the game instantly to your needs (Basically making your class OP).

You guys are never happy.

Originally posted by Spaceweed10

Originally posted by Plaidpants

Good to see they are fixing gtaoe without nerfing the crap out of the BW/sorc again.

 

On the contrary, it is potentially a huge nerf every time you are in the same place as another BW.

RoF will not damage anybody who is already being hit by the effect.  To another BW casting the same spell in the same area - ie the general area of the main fight - the one who casts 2nd will not see any return  for a 10sec chanelled spell.  Seem a good idea to you when you have 6 tanks and 3 Choppas beating on your healer in a Scenario?

The problem with RoF/PoS is not in Scenario's or skirmish fights, it's is solely in Keep/Fortress takes, where there is a single choke point being targetted.  This is where  the issue lies only, and it could have been solved in other ways first, instead of pandering to the ever increasing cry babies from WoW in this game.  These same people had much success on the Blizzard forums doing exactly the same thing.

The first thing that should have been done to alleviate this issue, is making at least one other entrance ramp available in Keeps/Fortresses.  Immediately, targetted damage would be halved and these attack/defence situations would be far more fun all round.  Some of us advocated this at the very start because this type of frustration was foreseen.  Mythic suddenly recognise the problem 6 months down the line, and inform us that redesigning these structures takes 'time'.  Listen to intelligent people in the first place and all this constant re-coding wouldn't be necessary.

Every time you 'adjust' something that people have gotten used to, it is akin to deprivation.  This causes frustration, anger and resentment, and quite often the cancellation of a sub.  Not the smartest move really, is it?

 

It was either that or cut the damage way down.

Yes - it will screw some people over - you just have to pay attention were you place them now... but the damage was still ridiculous - a GTAOE should NOT be critting people that hard. My alt (may be my main soon) is a BW and some of that damage is ridiculous. AoE in general seems to hit too hard in the game.

In  my opinion that will make keep fights even worse, the whole bloody problem problem with keeps is that bottleneck at the doors and inner keep stairs. They need to add breakable walls, and possibly ladders or siege towers.

What they are adding in this pacth will just makes keep fights lasy longer, making them even more repetitive than it already is.

I'm still playing the game and enjoying the Slayer at present but they do need to add diversity to sieging.

Originally posted by mcharj11

In  my opinion that will make keep fights even worse, the whole bloody problem problem with keeps is that bottleneck at the doors and inner keep stairs. They need to add breakable walls, and possibly ladders or siege towers.

What they are adding in this pacth will just makes keep fights lasy longer, making them even more repetitive than it already is.

I'm still playing the game and enjoying the Slayer at present but they do need to add diversity to sieging.

I agree that is one of the biggest problems, they mentioned that in 1.3 they would be adding extra ramps and they are looking into adding extra ways for attackers to overcome the walls.

The keep upgrade system is a way to get guilds and so on to be more interested in defending their keep, I think mythic are trying to stop people capping a keep, leaving it to be capped again then retaking it.

Imo although the keep upgrade system is very welcome, I find it extremely disappointing that it is based exclusively on gold. This is going to have some very unwelcome side effects that Mythic explicitly tried to avoid from day one.

1) the size of the guilds will now be even more important, thus further diminishing the viability of small guilds

2) gold will grow in importance thus promoting goldselling and all the attendant crap

For the life of me I do not understand why they went this dumb route...

It is quite obvious that they should have made keeps upgradeable through PvE missions in and around keeps. For example - the door repairs seller - lol if they've put some collectible wood scattered outside the keep it would be much much more interesting and would give tanks (for example) something exciting to do during keep sieges. We'd have people fighting all along the keep perimeter and not just at this one funnel that is the door.

Additionally, these PvE missions would provide a motivation for players to stick around keeps, give a sense of real accomplishment for keep growth and provide some activity in RvR lakes even when the opposing faction is somewhere else. Sheesh... talk about a missed opportunity to really fix this game's most glaring problem - badly designed open RvR that is entirely dependent on other faction (that are your enemies lol) playing ball.

Keep upgrades paid out of guild coffers = boring, impersonal and passive for individual players. Lol, bad design, plain and simple.

If they placed some damn mushrooms to be picked or mobs to be farmed in RvR lakes we'd have a 1000x more interesting PvP than what we have now. Why they chose to so hysterically separate PvP and PvE areas in this game is entirely beyond me. In WoW the best open PvP was always in places where there was something substantial to be fought over - farming areas - ironically the same as in DAoC. Hopefully Land of the Dead (opposed public quests, mixing PvE with PvP, PvP dungeons etc) will prove a great success and they'll finally apply the same principles to RvR lakes, what they should have done at the beginning.

Originally posted by markoraos

Imo although the keep upgrade system is very welcome, I find it extremely disappointing that it is based exclusively on gold. This is going to have some very unwelcome side effects that Mythic explicitly tried to avoid from day one.

1) the size of the guilds will now be even more important, thus further diminishing the viability of small guilds

2) gold will grow in importance thus promoting goldselling and all the attendant crap

For the life of me I do not understand why they went this dumb route...

 

It is quite obvious that they should have made keeps upgradeable through PvE missions in and around keeps. For example - the door repairs seller - lol if they've put some collectible wood scattered outside the keep it would be much much more interesting and would give tanks (for example) something exciting to do during keep sieges. We'd have people fighting all along the keep perimeter and not just at this one funnel that is the door.

Additionally, these PvE missions would provide a motivation for players to stick around keeps, give a sense of real accomplishment for keep growth and provide some activity in RvR lakes even when the opposing faction is somewhere else. Sheesh... talk about a missed opportunity to really fix this game's most glaring problem - badly designed open RvR that is entirely dependent on other faction (that are your enemies lol) playing ball.

Keep upgrades paid out of guild coffers = boring, impersonal and passive for individual players. Lol, bad design, plain and simple.

If they placed some damn mushrooms to be picked or mobs to be farmed in RvR lakes we'd have a 1000x more interesting PvP than what we have now. Why they chose to so hysterically separate PvP and PvE areas in this game is entirely beyond me. In WoW the best open PvP was always in places where there was something substantial to be fought over - farming areas - ironically the same as in DAoC. Hopefully Land of the Dead (opposed public quests, mixing PvE with PvP, PvP dungeons etc) will prove a great success and they'll finally apply the same principles to RvR lakes, what they should have done at the beginning.

Have to say this does sound like an interesting way to go about it :)

Originally posted by Pheace

Originally posted by markoraos

Imo although the keep upgrade system is very welcome, I find it extremely disappointing that it is based exclusively on gold. This is going to have some very unwelcome side effects that Mythic explicitly tried to avoid from day one.

1) the size of the guilds will now be even more important, thus further diminishing the viability of small guilds

2) gold will grow in importance thus promoting goldselling and all the attendant crap

For the life of me I do not understand why they went this dumb route...

 

It is quite obvious that they should have made keeps upgradeable through PvE missions in and around keeps. For example - the door repairs seller - lol if they've put some collectible wood scattered outside the keep it would be much much more interesting and would give tanks (for example) something exciting to do during keep sieges. We'd have people fighting all along the keep perimeter and not just at this one funnel that is the door.

Additionally, these PvE missions would provide a motivation for players to stick around keeps, give a sense of real accomplishment for keep growth and provide some activity in RvR lakes even when the opposing faction is somewhere else. Sheesh... talk about a missed opportunity to really fix this game's most glaring problem - badly designed open RvR that is entirely dependent on other faction (that are your enemies lol) playing ball.

Keep upgrades paid out of guild coffers = boring, impersonal and passive for individual players. Lol, bad design, plain and simple.

If they placed some damn mushrooms to be picked or mobs to be farmed in RvR lakes we'd have a 1000x more interesting PvP than what we have now. Why they chose to so hysterically separate PvP and PvE areas in this game is entirely beyond me. In WoW the best open PvP was always in places where there was something substantial to be fought over - farming areas - ironically the same as in DAoC. Hopefully Land of the Dead (opposed public quests, mixing PvE with PvP, PvP dungeons etc) will prove a great success and they'll finally apply the same principles to RvR lakes, what they should have done at the beginning.

 

Have to say this does sound like an interesting way to go about it :)

Imo, that's the only way. Pure game theory, plain and simple. People will always go for safe rewards - and that is taking unopposed BOs and keeps, no matter how much more lucrative the "unsafe" activities are (unsafe in the sense that you're not guaranteed some kind of fun or rewards after all that running, if the destros don't show up or they show up in too great numbers you've just wasted a lot of time on unfun activity). Until they put some modicum of "safety" to open RvR we'll have a game that totters on the brink of musical chairs... and the only way to do it is to place content that is not dependent on other players being there = PvE.

The major failing of WAR is that its devs obviously do not understand wargame design, which is a failing endemic in to ALL current mmorpg designers (curse the damn Everquest!) except for EVE online, ofc. They operated under the assumption that PvP = killing other players, which is the most banal, limited and frankly prejudiced (the EVIL PKer!) perception possible. In good PvP games (that's counting all competetive games everywhere, including chess) , killing others is never the only or even the main goal. A good conflict-based game is always about opposing factions having their own goals that happen to conflict somehow. In Risk your goal is not to kill other players... you re killing others only because they're standing in your way to accomplish the real goal - and that is to take over the map. Imagine Risk without this "PvE" goal - whoever kills most other armies wins. Utter boredom.

Placing a mushroom patch at the center of each RvR lake with "black dye drops here" notice above it would do much more for open RvR than anything they've done so far.

Ofc, a fanboi disclaimer here: WAR is still the best PvP, and especially mass PvP game out there and I'm still very happily subbed. However, this tells a lot about the sad state of the genre right now for WAR does have a lot of problems and missed opportunities there. It is all still fixable, ofc, but it is a real pain to see that it could have been so much better from the start if only they paid some attention to the basic design and psychology of what is the main selling point of their game.

interesting thoughts.

For the most part i have thought of mythics approach where i disagree as bad calls but decent implementation!  (2 factions instead of more, servers and server pride , scenarios and crosqueing, the euro, amerika , occeania split and so on!) 

But with RvR lakes its the opposit! thats a good call but basicly so lacking! Thanks for puting words on that

As for the pure game theory, and understanding wargame design and from my Fanboi perspective! I begin to hope alot that the makers of GW2 learns something from the War eksperience! Simply because guildwars is the game i have played that have done the best work with the approach they have taken! But thats another discussion.

---

Originally posted by mcharj11 In  my opinion that will make keep fights even worse, the whole bloody problem problem with keeps is that bottleneck at the doors and inner keep stairs. They need to add breakable walls, and possibly ladders or siege towers.
What they are adding in this pacth will just makes keep fights lasy longer, making them even more repetitive than it already is.
I'm still playing the game and enjoying the Slayer at present but they do need to add diversity to sieging.

---

Breakable walls or ladders/siege towers would be things that add actual variety. I also liked the other suggestion in this thread of the PvE quests that would upgrade keeps. Such quests could also be added to BOs so we could have something to do rather than sitting around waiting for that boring timer to run out.

Such quests would also add badly needed XP sources for oRvR for players who want to do mostly oRvR rather than being forced to level through PvE.

Also I'm part of a small guild and it is worrying if these changes will make small guilds even less popular. We'll have to see how they end up working.

Originally posted by jondifool

interesting thoughts.

For the most part i have thought of mythics approach where i disagree as bad calls but decent implementation!  (2 factions instead of more, servers and server pride , scenarios and crosqueing, the euro, amerika , occeania split and so on!) 

But with RvR lakes its the opposit! thats a good call but basicly so lacking! Thanks for puting words on that

As for the pure game theory, and understanding wargame design and from my Fanboi perspective! I begin to hope alot that the makers of GW2 learns something from the War eksperience! Simply because guildwars is the game i have played that have done the best work with the approach they have taken! But thats another discussion.

I had high hopes for Guild Wars 2, given that GW's original RPG (char advancement) system which dispenses with the silly leveling anachronism from single-player games is imo the best one around in mmos. However i've heard that since GW2 is supposed to be a persistent world environment that they plan to increase the level cap... their argument being that persistent online worlds require leveling - while the exact opposite is true. That awful convention has to die finally (10 years overdue, lol!) and I hoped GW2 would be the one to kill it.

Leveling makes sense ONLY in single player games, if that. It is the DEATH of massive online environments which thrive on sociability and freedom which is what linear leveling and linear content design destroy. Is there "leveling" in any massive online service?!? Do you see us gaining levels in Facebook or Myspace? Unlocking features or anything?! And especially do you see user stratification based on time spent  there? "Oh you have only 50 friends so you can't chat or do wall-to-wall with your friend who has 200." Lol this is so silly a concept that it is beyond words. There is no justification to it whatsoever except inertia - "everybody else has it so we must have it too". Imo the greatest single conceptual fail of WAR is that it not only retained that ridiculous leveling paradigm but it even emphasized it with silly artificial and immersion-breaking tiers and whatnots.

There is a reason why people rush through those levels lol... The real game always begins at the max level where everybody is basically the same. What the hell is the reason to have players spend 90% of their playing time in the 10% of total content?!?! Wouldn't it be more economical to have most content  where players spend the vast majority of their subscription?! Can anyone tell me what is the point to the whole damn Azeroth when the game "begins at max level"?

Lol, if someone designed a MMO with Facebook design philosophy I'd pay 50$ a month to play it. Say, a Facebook Fallout 3 crossover on a range of different playworlds. Do what you want, with whoever you want. No "grind to earn the right  to have the fun you paid for" or "pretend you're playing a single player game where you're saving the world" crap. If you want to be the top dog go ahead, but if you're casual you won't be gimped or looked down for it. Damn, is it so hard to understand?

Ofc there should be character advancement, no question about it, but imo GW original is the only one mmo which was on the right track. If they put high level caps into their game, as well as "designated PvP zones" that I heard of, you'll think WAR was a miracle of good RvR design. Lol, this genre keeps devolving and devolving. Sometimes I hope Everquest and WoW never happened at all... silly D&D linear leveling games. Super Mario Land online with orcs, elves and sh*** lol. No wonder they are still having trouble with that - you try designing a Super Mario massive online... practically thay are still hanging on to the basic game design paradigm "go up up up the levels!" they inherited from the arcades.

Damn, 3/4 of all fundamental WAR failings are a direct result of this idiotic leveling crap. If they made all characters start at rank 40 and progress exclusively through tome and renown unlocks as well as gear they'd have a 1000X better game. The other 1/4 is due to silly hysteric separation of the game into "pure PvE" and "pure PvP" zones - which is another throwback to the old school "heroes journey and evil PKer out to ruin our game" line of thought. The tragedy is that GW2 devs are repeating exactly the same mistakes that are plaguing WAR now.

Originally posted by markoraos

If they placed some damn mushrooms to be picked or mobs to be farmed in RvR lakes we'd have a 1000x more interesting PvP than what we have now.

There are quests like that in every warcamp. Think about, from the Empire/Chaos T1 side, how many quests from the first warcamp force you to explore the entire RVR like. Granted, I agree there could be more though.

You make some really good points though. Additionally, I think it would be cool to see some opposing PQ's in every RVR lake, that don't revolve around battlefield domination, but just for improved loot. There are plenty of open spaces in the RVR lakes.

server crash

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server crash

server crash

server crash

server crash
 

Originally posted by mcfeters

Originally posted by markoraos

If they placed some damn mushrooms to be picked or mobs to be farmed in RvR lakes we'd have a 1000x more interesting PvP than what we have now.

 

There are quests like that in every warcamp. Think about, from the Empire/Chaos T1 side, how many quests from the first warcamp force you to explore the entire RVR like. Granted, I agree there could be more though.

Well that's a good example of what I meant when I said that Mythic doesn't understand wargame design. Those quests are, although nominally PvE in RvR, actually quite useless for the pupose of encouraging RvR.

In order to be effective they would have to become repeatable (yes, i know about those repeatable quest chains, i'm talking about the scouting quests) and they would have to lead players of the opposing factions into the same spot. That's the whole point of those RvR PvE missions - give opposing players a reason to find themselves in the same place at the same time and let nature take its course. Put a gold apple in the middle of a zone (ONE gold apple, not 4 all over the place!) and you'll have loads of RvR.

This is particularly important point - ONE spot for players to congregate to. Remember that event a while ago with those hero ogres in RvR lakes? Well its a great idea... but the whole thing bombed because there were FOUR ogres per RvR lake and thus each faction had an opportunity to avoid each other and farm those mobs in peace... RvR increase = zero.  It is mind-boggling how Mythic failed to anticipate this.. if they placed ONE ogre in there I guarantee you you'd have constant fighting over the kill.