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Warhammer 40K: Dark Millennium Online General Article: Games Day Report
This past weekend, MMORPG.com's Garrett Fuller had the opportunity to head to Games Day in Baltimore, Maryland. During his time at the event, Garrett checked out some of the stuff Games Workshop has in store for fans. Included in the visit was a look at the next Warhammer Online update and the Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millenium Online trailer.
By Garrett Fuller on August 23, 2010
This past weekend MMORPG.com went down to Games Day to check out some of the Games Workshop goodies that are coming out. Warhammer Online was there showing off its latest patch which is heavy on the Skaven. As well as THQ showing some Dawn of War II goodness and the new trailer for Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millenium. If any of you have been in a bubble for the last six months; that is the Warhammer 40,000 MMO. Overall the day had some good things to offer and gave us some insight into why table top games are making a comeback.
Games Workshop always does a fantastic job for its fans. The layout of the Balitmore Convention Center was fantasic and tables were there for everyone to enjoy Speed Painting, open gaming, sponsored tables, and most of all, the Forge World store. If you play either of the Warhammers, it is obvious that Forge World is becoming more and more popular among enthusiast gamers. The Forge World line was huge and the work was amazing. Of all the displays at the show, nothing impresses me more than the Golden Deamon Compeition. After painting miniatures for years, I am still blown away by the artistry of some of the entries. Even if you are not a fan of Games Workshop, check out the Golden Deamon Miniatures, they truly are amazing.
THQ had a booth at the show and was talking heavily about Dawn of War 2. However they were showing off the new trailer for Warhammer 40,000: Dark Millenium Online. Though it had some bits thrown in from the other trailer, it still focused on the playable race, The Imperium of Man. Basically this sums up the idea that both Space Marines and Imperial Guard will be playable as part of the same faction. They also say Playbale Race not faction in the trailer, which to be clear, means they could be part of a faction mixed in with the Eldar. Yes, I know this is a rumor, but again the Imperium of Man is defined as a race.
Other than the obvious Space Marines and Imperial Guard, they do mention Tech Priests which begs a class in the game. My biggest hope with the game is that they will not have a two faction split. If you see the Imperium teaming up with the Eldar and Tau to fight again Chaos, Orks, and Tyranids or something, it will just be frustrating. With all of these MMO companies quick to grab Games Workshop IPs to make games out of, they forget that the biggest appeal is the variety of factions warring against each other. Sure in an MMO it is risky to have population imbalance, but overall that is still the appeal of GW products.
For Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, the team was on hand to talk about the last patch and fixes to the game. In a quiet presentation that lacked the punch of pre-launch WAR sessions, the team took a lot of time to answer player questions and address specific issues on the game. A lot is being done with Open RVR and giving players a boost in Realm Ranks to 100. I hope they don’t make them immposible to get numbers wise. The biggest questions surrounded the Skaven are the new zones and playability of possible Skaven characters. Something fans in the game have been screaming for since launch. With WAR now really working on what the player base wants, it seems like there are a lot of possibilities for the player base to influence the future of the game. A trend we are seeing more and more in MMOs with hardcore user bases. If you are a fan or player of Warhammer Online, let your voice be heard, the team at Bioware Mythic is definitely listening.
Overall Games Day was a great time. The THQ 40K Orc from E3 was on hand, one of the coolest props ever and drew a huge crowd with it walked out into the sea of GW fans. From an MMO perspective, nothing major was shown or discussed, but we were happy to see both Bioware Mythic and THQ represented at the show. Also, the Ultramarines movie coming out this fall was showing a trailer and looked awesome.
In general, Games Workshop does a great job and has proven over time the fan base of table top war games continues to age and grow. It does seem like a lot of gamers are going back to grass roots gaming lately and this was a good example of how players are getting back into what made gaming great in the early years.
it is great that mythic started to listen but they should go up to THQ and be like. HEY!! DONT GO TWO FACTIONS!! TRUST ME!!!!
I wont mind 2 factions at all if it was Eldar and imperial vs chaos and orkz though they gotta do it right. Dont want to see orkz in a chaos city just selling goods. Also Space marines on a craftworld going . "Hey,I am on a dying race craftworld and we are a really intolerant race towards them. :D no no no plz.
no adding necrons to destro, no tau to order, no tyranids to destro plz!.
maby have a lil ally then once it get to a climax then have a big free for all :D.
Good read though :D
IF they add only two factions, i doubt tyranids would be a playable race, but rather mobs.
I'd expect Tyranids to be a mob, not faction/playable. Their style seems to suit it more than rolling a Hormagaunt "class" does... shrug.
They already announced in a recent interview that there would definitively be only 2 factions. They stated that Games Workshop is totally cool with it and for some unknown reason it works well with the game setting.
Here's the link: http://www.strategyinformer.com/pc/warhammer40000darkmilleniumonline/interviews.html
"Strategy Informer: I assume you're going to divide up the playable races by factions? They only thing is, apart from ones like Imperial guard and Space Marines who can stick together, not all of the other races fit neatly into 'factions'. The Eldar, the Tau, the Necrons, Tyranids Chaos... had to generalise them. Are you going to try sticking with the traditional two factions or branch out to more?
Tim Campbell: We're going to have two overall factions in the game, and all of the playable races are going to fit into one or the other.
There are compelling reasons why that works in this situation and our game, and Games Workshops are completely on board with it so we're not doing anything that violates the IP or the fiction – the details though will be revealed in the near future"
temporary alliance of some sort, mos tlikely, with story reason;.
It happened in canon a few times.
I know they are doing the 2 faction system but tbh if they play this one like warhammer online then it will fail and ruin the best IP ever. I hope they have different builds for the space marine, i predict they will use him as the 'tank' class for the Imperium of Man but they are so much more, its frustrating when companies make mistakes when they dont listen to the seasoned mmo player base.
Yeah, table top games are making a comeback because video games these days are so shitty. In reality though, both are a pretty dead medium. Table top gaming died years ago, and video games are pretty much dead these days as well. Things dont look good for either medium, and I kinda doubt they're ever gonna make a real comeback =/.
Am I the only one who's bothered that while 2 factions fit the lore, it does not fit the RvR MMO genre, and yet they're doing it anyway?
I can see it making sense if it was never tried before, like what they did with WAR. But now that we've seen WAR, shouldn't a lesson be learned here? I can't believe that the devs for 40k are not aware of WAR. And that being the case, what's their reasoning behind 2 factions? Why 2 factions didn't work for WAR, but will work for 40k? I don't get it.
WAR didn't fail because of it had only 2 factions. It failed because the dev team didn't plan ahead and implemented an endgame that would crash the server and it took months just to get that fixed. The basic mechanics of the game played like they were in alpha. I still blame EA for making them rush the game out a year before they wanted to.
Because they are lazy? Lack talent? Lack vision? Don't really care if the game fails in the long term so long as they make a profit on box sales and a couple of months subscription before players drop out?
I suppose I should repost this... Again.
"Just to contribute a little bit, the 8th edition rulebook of Warhammer Fantasy Battles includes Allied Army rules (basically, rules to further facilitate team games) that splits the playable armies into Order and Destruction. Those are:
Order: High Elves, Dwarfs, Wood Elves, the Empire, Bretonnia, and Lizardmen.
Destruction: Chaos (Including Warriors of, Daemons of, and Beastmen), Skaven, Dark Elves, Vampire Counts, and Orcs and Goblins.
That said, there are two armies who, due to either a mercenary nature (Ogre Kingdoms), or simply being far-removed and somewhat insular (Tomb Kings of Khemri), simply get classed as Non-Aligned.
Neither Order nor Destruction are identified as a unified front, but more point towards the general inclinations and behaviors of the respective races which lend themselves to getting along, though only when the situation renders such an alliance necessary.
Now, of course, in 40k, the lines are a bit broader due to the inherent and religiously-fervent racism of the Imperium. However, as much as they may hate the Eldar and the Tau, they would still sooner fight along-side them than allow Chaos to gain so much as an inch (though usually the Eldar simply don't give them an opportunity to refuse). Mechanics aside (since I assume we're talking lore here), alliances of convenience have cropped up every now and again in lore, particularly when Abaddon or Ghazghkull get froggy. Radical Inquisitors have been known to accept help from Eldar and other sources (being staunch pragmatists, to the point of being unhealthy). So long as the in-game lore doesn't make it sound too buddy-buddy, I personally can deal."
In summation: Order vs. Destruction is a Games Workshop construct used to facilitate team games of their tabletop.
I understand that, I totally do. But the original question remains:
Why are they going with that for the MMO?
While it certainly works lore-wise, it could also work lore-wise to have more than 2 factions. And since we're not talking about another 40k table-top game here, it should be considered. They're translating an IP between two different mediums, Tabletop and MMO-Video-Game. Those two mediums behave differently, and one of those differences is that in an RvR game, 2 factions is too limiting to the point of ruining the game.
So even if the lore says it's ok, why do it? Or even if you want to ignore that question, and assume that GW is making them do 2 factions, the question then becomes "how are they going to make it work this time?"
Yes, in Table Top.
So, how long does a Table Top game last?
As you say "alliances of convenience have cropped up every now and again in lore".
The problem is - this won't be temporary - it will be permanent.
If Vigil set up the game to allow temporary alliances they could use that to their advantage to help with game balance.
If (for example) 70% of players chose to play Space Marines at one time they could allow a temporary alliance to form between Chaos, Orc, Dark Eldar and another between Tau and Eldar while leaving the Space Marines on their own... as player populations shifted back to a more even balance they dissolve those alliances. The obvious advantage to this is that this could be done automatically as a balancing mechanism and done right could even be fun.
But hard coding in two factions doesn't leave a lot of options. When 70% of your player pop goes 'order' then what do you do? Your Chaos players are about to get a beating... and what do MMO players do when they get a beating night after night?
Something to do with an option on the "Account Management" page usually.
my problem w/ 2 faction pvp is all about population disbalance, not so much lore. In war they had all the cool stuff on destruction side, and the good guys had a choice between short ugly fat guys, crossdressing elves and humans with frilly clothes, not a big surprise most people preffer destruction hahahaha.
My personal opinion on the two vs. multiple factions discussion is truthfully indifferent. However, Games Workshop has been known to be somewhat heavy-handed in the handling of its IP, so their official take on the matter bore mentioning.
A more temporary alliance system would certainly be preferred, with some limitations. The average Space Marine would sooner cut off his own testicles than even consider fighting alongside Chaos, for example, and would likely be executed for doing so (which is precisely the type of reaction the Allied Armies rules are meant to symbolize). From an MMO developer's perspective, it's perhaps easier to keep the playerbase in two camps, even though this does sometimes result in the scenarios you proposed. To a certain extent, it also allows out of game friends to still team up without forcing them to all play one race.
To answer your question, if you'll allow me to be the devil's advocate a moment, a tabletop game lasts anywhere between half an hour to eight hours or beyond, depending on the size of the game. That said, some of the "campaigns" from which the Allied Armies system drew its origins can last many years, in terms of lore.
Maybe the 2 factions will be something simple like dividing the races into Order and Chaos.
Aside from that matter, isn't anyone else bothered by this recycled use of WoW, ROM, War, Allods, etc art style that from a non-Warhammer player perspective feels wrong? I said this elsewhere but what would make this game stand out is perhaps some Gears of Wars art style, not necesarily cutting edge graphics but something dark, with gore and epic dismemberment in its art, dark ambient tones because no battlefield is vivid and lush and rainbowsy.
Of cource thats just me and I have never played any Warhammer.
They really watered down the lore for WAR, and I expect THQ/GW will do the same now with 40K. For example, in WAR Malekith and the Orc Warboss are just hanging out in the Chaos capital. Even if they are all "Destruction", they wouldn't be that cozy. I know they cut the Dark Elf and Orc cities, but Malekith and the Warboss should have at least been surrounded by their own armies. Malekith would never leave himself exposed, and only an idiot would let Orcs roam freely in his city.
Games Workshop should be shot for ruining the IP the way they have handled the MMO development. I don't know how you guys can interview someone from that company and not take them to task.
If 40k only has two factions it will just be another disaster just like Warhammer.
Anyone looking forward to 40k needs to take those rose colored glasses off and wake up to the fact they it probably won't be any better than warhammer.
Such a shame too, the IP could really be something great if done right.
you just hit the nail on it's head dude... i shouted a WTF!!!??? when i saw that
Ever since I hear them say that they were trying to attract the wow crowd. That is when I decided all hope was lost with this game. GW2 is gonna be innovating. It has amazing graphics, and animations. I couldn't see myself paying a sub for a game that wants to clone wow. I would rather just go with Anet on the B2p format, at least they have something new to bring to the table.
Yea, I know that blizzard stole the whole warcraft/starcraft Idea from Gameworkshop, but no excuse to try and emulate them further.
Why is a Warhammer Online picture shown here?
2 factions = fail. Every MMO that i have played and has PvP/RvR in it with only 2 factions is doomes a PvP game. It just doesn't work. DAoC was brilliant in RvR.... i just do not understand why they keep bringing out PvP games with only 2 factions, it is plain boring in the end........
first off the new trailer looks awesome,but then it all starts to go wrong, 2 factions would only work if this was a more inquisitor (rpg) style MMO, but it seems even though its called dark mellenium (also RPG) they are trying to aim for the non RPG crowd, its very rare setting that a space marine will go exploring alone, let alone team up with an Eldar,the races only team up when there is a greater threat, ie Abbadons crusdae, Ghazkul Thrakkars Ork tide and the Tyranid swarm, in the RPG books, inquisitors will use any means to destroy the greater threat (chaos), as a long term tabletop player (20 years) and a long term RPG (inquisitor and dark mellenium) player, i will wait for more info to emerge and try and get on the beta, before i pass proper judgement
The problem with games workshop games being made in to an mmo is that every race/country is independent in the gw lore. Occasionally a couple races/countries will partner up to battle a common enemy but in the end it's a free for all. There aren't enough players to make that work. Even if a gw mmo was the #1 game, if every race was independent, there wouldn't be enough players to make it fun. WAR is based on a time when 2 massive treaties are made between the "good" and "evil" races to just go at it. Yes there needs to be a 3rd faction and I think they are slowly incorporating one but in the warhammer world there's only a few races/countries that could be considered neutral and even between them it's not like ogres are gonna partner up with skaven etc. With a 40k game you have the same problem. It could be done and it could be awsome but there needs to be enough players to make it work.
Just make sure I can pick a Inquisitor. Thats all I ask. Make it so.
As a 40K player I think the graphics they are using fairly represent the 40K world as well as miniatures and artwork. Hell the Ork Biyz trukk looks almost exactly like the plastic model. Also to touch on the darkness of 40K, for me the Darkness is more about the background things going on in the universe than appearance on the screen. There are many bright and vibrant colors in the 40K universe. There is an Entire Ork clan that wears armour and paints their vehicles yellow, The Imperial Fist Space Marines wear yellow armour, The Blood Angels wear Red Armour, The Eldar Crafworlds have many different brightly colored themes. Even Chaos, who you would think would be the Darkest of Dark, have bright colors such as the Pink and Black armour of the Emperor's Children. Even if you look to Chaos Daemons you will see 2 of the 4 Gods favor bright colors, Slaneesh favors just about any bright contrasting colors and Tzeentch like blues purple and pink.
Anyway that is just my thoughts on the graphics. As far as factions, I would have preferred more than 2, but having only 2 won't keep me from playing the game.
So its going to be another 2 faction affair just like every other mmo, with one side inevitably crushing the other. Great. Just fuckin great. Just what 40k needed.
I'm still going to pick this game up bc I'm a huge 40k fan, but I'm certainly gonna be dissapointed as hell seeing as how its another stupid cliche 2 faction affair.
If you're gonna do an MMO that has as much conflict in the universe as 40k, at least have some balls and go 3 factions instead of 2. At least take a look at WAR and see where 2 factions got it. Yes, WAR quite clearly had more problems than just being constricted with 2 factions, but you cannot deny that was a big part of the problem with WAR RvR.
I am so bored to death with Warhammer... Warmachine is so much better alll around... Nothing about this game excites me.. I am more interested in the Warmachine Game that is in development and its not even an MMO
And this is why the current trend in sub-par releases continues.
They know that people like you will pay $60 for a turd-in-a-box so long as it has artwork from your favourite IP on the box.
So, they figure out how many boxes they will sell based on that... and spend enough on development not to be prosecuted for fraud. They figure that even a turd-in-a-box will have some subscription retention by those who hope that the first patch will be a 'miracle patch' and then they may even sell lifetime subs (only available pre-release) to really milk it.\
And if the game is a dog? And fails in 3 months (but limps on for another year or two...)? Who cares? They don't because they made their projected profits.
The 2 faction thing so far is the only thing I've ever been bothered with about this game. It really pisses me off.
I'm going to still pick it up not just because of the IP, but the gameplay style is something I have been looking for in an MMO for years now.
As much as I can't stand the fact that it will be a 2 faction deal, it is not enough to pass the game up over personally. I still think it will be a great game with the best IP ever. I just think the game has more potential with 3 factions instead of 2, especially if you've ever played Dark Age of Camelot.