Each week, I will post a list of the top 10 articles that I found while exploring the tubes of the internet and blogosphere. This list is purely subjective and based on my opinion alone, so take it for what it’s worth.

1. Spinks reviews the latest change to renown for healers in scenarios. Previously, healers got renown for any healing they did in a scenario. Now, they only get renown for healing members of their team that were involved in killing a member of the opposite team. Bottom line: you get less renown for healing tanks and other healers and more renown for healing the high DPS classes. Lame.

2. In an interview with Ten Ton Hammer, Mark Jacobs revealed that after the Black Guard and the Knight of the Blazing Sun, we will see the return of either the Hammerer or the Choppa…one of them may be replaced with a different career. Most are putting their money on the Hammerer being replaced with the Slayer.

3. For Halloween, Warhammer Online will feature an in-game event called Witching Night. Boss monsters with phat loot will be lurking in the RvR lakes. Not only will you have to down the boss, you’ll have to contend with the opposite faction, too.

4. Thanks to Draegan for pointing us to a post on F13.net in which Mark Jacobs discusses Mythic’s plans to get players out of the scenarios and into open RvR and RvR lakes. He says, and I quote, “We are going to boost RvR like crazy, it’s going to be the place to be.  You’d have to have 10 tons of brain damage not to go open RvR.” It’s a long thread but worth the read. I suggest skimming it for Mark’s responses, which offer a lot of insight into the future direction of Warhammer Online.

5. Ainilome asks, “Why can’t we pass on PQ loot bags?” Good question.

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Welcome to the last Art of WAR dealing with Tier 1 and 2 scenarios. Future entries will deal with general RvR till I get my little Dwarf butt higher up so I can compete in Tier 3 scenarios rather than being perpetual roadkill.

This one is a short one and deals with the two scenarios I didn’t cover previously. Tier 1’s Gates of Ekrund and Tier 2’s Stonetroll Crossing.

Gates Of Ekrund

Mechanic

There are three flags, captured in the same way as the Nordenwatch scenario. One is straight in the structure and up some ramps on either side. The third in in a lower central area between them. The more flags you have, the faster you gain points.

General Method of Play

Most teams go for the nearest capture, which is also the easiest to defend. You go up the ramp immediately to your left when entering the Gates themselves and will find either the Supply Dump or Ammo Room (if I recall correctly). Outside of these flag rooms there is a balcony type area overlooking the centre flag and facing the opposite side. The centre flag can either be accessed by going right when entering the Gates themselves or by jumping (or taking the path) down from the higher flag.

Some “clever” teams rush right for the centre flag and leave a few stragglers to pick up the higher one. With enough momentum or luck, a team can hold all three flags, but as there is always two spots reinforcements can come from, that state of affairs rarely lasts.

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Welcome ladies and gents to a tardy entry in the Art of War. Yes I know, I am teh suck.

Anyway without further ado, I present to you the Mourkain Temple.

Mourkain Temple is a scenario based in the Dwarf versus Greenskin pairing, and the first time such forces come across it is in Tier 2. As a result, it is very much like what anyone will see when they hit the Marshes of Madness. Water, weeds and ruins. The Mourkain? Some crazy manlings who dabbled in magic and got themselves dead (but not at rest, take heed). The temple? It’s the resting place of an artifact, and of course everyone wants it. Here’s how it works.

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My name is Ysharros and I’m an altoholic– err, altophile. Just in case you’re new to this column.

This week, I’m going to take a quick(ish) look at the alts I’ve got on Averheim and their progress through Tier 1, since I spent much of the past week playing one or the other of them up to R10 or so. See, now I can add journalistic obligation to my reasons for altoholic enablement! Grab a drink, sit back, and get comfy, for while I’ll try to keep each mini-review short and sweet…I do have a lot of alts.

This is not a career guide, as there are plenty of good, in-depth ones already out there, including right here at Hammer of WAR. It’s more like a travel journal: what I’ve played through Tier 1, how much I liked it, what I didn’t like. It probably won’t help serial monophiles figure out what to play next, but it may well be of use to the hesitant or choice-paralysed altophile.

Ysharros, R21/RR16 Shadow Warrior

Shadow Warriors can be a challenge to play, certainly to play well. In the first dozen or so levels, you’ll have to learn to stance-dance: shadow warriors get their three stances within the first 6 levels, and each stance has its own specific abilities (many of which are shared across 2 stances) and benefits. Scout stance is the classic “plink from a distance” stance and gives ballistic & initiative bonuses; assault stance favours limited but mobile shooting and hand-to-hand attacks and gives strength and weapon skill bonuses; and Skirmish stance is a mobile, shoot and scoot type stance with toughness and crit chance bonuses.

Knowing which stance to use when, and being able to switch between them at the right time, can be a challenge, especially in RvR. Hotbar organisation can also be a real pain in the backside to begin with, since many abilities can be used in more than one stance, or across all stances; making sure all relevant abilities are present in each of the bars used by a given stance isn’t always easy, but it’s essential.

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It’s good to be back.  My internet was out all last week, and that was a spot of fun.

So this week I’m going to cover all the mods from last week and this week.  To help make up for this, I’m going to skip the reviews for this week.

Tip of the Week

Evidently some people have seen performance upgrades by turning up certain graphics settings.

I actually didn’t do this myself, but I was inspired to try turning up my graphics “all the way”.  My original settings were 1024 * 768 on the lowest “performance” settings (except sight distance).  I changed them to 1600 * 1200 with the highest performance settings, and it was slower.  However, it wasn’t that much slower, and the game looks a thousand times better.  So I’ve decided to stick with the ramped up settings for now.

I’m hoping this means that there’s a lot of work to do on low-end performance.  My wife’s (new) laptop is having a bear of a time running WAR.

Question of the Week

Anyway, concerning the reviews, I have a question for you guys.  Usually I try to review new mods that came out that week.  Since they are so new, however, they often don’t work.  This actually makes reviewing really easy for me, but I’m also not showing you guys mods you can use.

So, which do you prefer: reviews of new mods (which will often be “it doesn’t work”), or reviews of slightly older mods that actually work?

I’d appreciate your feedback.  But enough jibber-jabber!  On to the…

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Welcome back to The Devil’s Details! As always, I’m your host, Dante. I’ll keep the introduction short this week and get right to the good stuff. I’ll begin with a fact, in fact.

Men Hate Shopping

Men do not shop. “Shopping” involves wandering aimlessly through a crowded space for several hours, waiting for something to capture your attention and say, “Buy Me!” Supposedly this is a great reason to not only spoil your entire day, but to warrant calling your friends ahead of time so you can schedule a meeting to ensure an entire group of people can waste a perfectly good day en masse. There is as much “joy” to be had as there is money to be wasted during this time of endless prattling and laughter. At least, that’s what women tell me. Something about great sales, shoes, and chocolate. Personally, I don’t buy that (no pun intended). The above is a “Woman Thing” only. Men would never do this. Women shop and men buy. It’s just our way. Simple and direct; efficient. It worked fine this way for years…and then Mythic went and screwed up that entire system beautifully.

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Each week, I will post a list of the top 10 articles that I found while exploring the tubes of the internet and blogosphere. This list is purely subjective and based on my opinion alone, so take it for what it’s worth.

1. Altdorf apparently “fell” on the Averheim server, this time for real. Coincidentally, this is where I’m playing my Rune Priest. Normally, I stay away from most forums, as they generally tend to consist of insults and barbs thrown by civilized people devolved into internet idiots. However, there’s a pretty good thread over on Warhammer Alliance about it. Mark Jacobs gives his response on the VN Boards, and the WAR blogosphere is consumed by the subject. You can find some of the better coverage by reading these posts by Tobold, Thulf, Rog, and Heartless. Br3ntbr0, however, points us to a follow-on post by Mark Jacobs, which further clarifies how Altdorf fell so quickly. Leo also points out that Altdorf did not fall; it was merely thrown into a contested state.

2. Great write-up on trophies and bestial tokens by Thulf. I must have missed the memo, because I didn’t know what the hell bestial tokens did until I read his post.

3. Syncaine implores you to slow down and enjoy Warhammer Online. Unlike most MMORPGs, there is plenty of content throughout the levels. If you race to the end-game, you’re going to miss out on a lot. This is one of the reasons I don’t feel that frantic need to hit the level cap.

4. Not much blogging about WAR dungeons going on, but fortunately Arbitrary doesn’t disappoint with his overview of Gunbad, a three-wing public dungeon in the Badlands.

5. In an interview with GameIndustry.biz, Blizzard’s COO states that over half of those who cited Warhammer Online as their reason for leaving World of Warcraft have returned. Whether that means over 25,000 out of 50,000 or 25 out of 50, we shall never know, but I’m betting it’s closer to 25.

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It’s hard to believe it’s been a month since release. I guess having played in closed beta, it would feel like longer. From closed beta to release, quite a bit changed. Since release though, not an awful lot has changed apart from hot fixes, although it does at least appear that the devs are listening if what Mark Jacobs has said is anything to go by. The game has received good reviews so far, although I find it quite hard to give such games proper reviews this early in its life. It is a month after release, though, so what do I think of the game thus far?

My character is now Rank 21, almost 22. At times, the game has been fun, but mainly when I’m in any form of RvR (being a predominantly RvR-minded player, it would be). Overall, however, I’ve found the game repetitive and, to be quite frank, boring–especially with regards to PvE.  As to why…well, here are the details.

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Welcome back to “Kick in the Waaagh!”, a column detailing the life and times of the Goblin Shaman career in Warhammer Online.  Before we get into the article for today, I wanted to touch briefly on a response to last week’s article in the event that this quite useful information was overlooked by any up and coming Shamans.

Last week, reader Chronozan asked if there were any mods that could help with targetting in RvR, specifically when it came to healing friendly players.  Joey was kind enough to point out two mods designed for just such a task: Squared and IsHealBot.  This are great tools to try and use if you find yourself having trouble keeping the Waaagh! flowing in RvR.

Interested in pursuing more mods to help you or make the game more streamlined?  Be sure to read AddOn Roundup, hosted right here on Hammer of War Online!

Now then, to today’s article; together we are going to discuss the Tier One Scenarios and how a Goblin Shaman fits into these.  Keep in mind that due to the low rank associated with these Scenarios, we aren’t going to see much of difference in our role versus say, the Zealot.  Either way, as the first in a short series of Tier One Cleanups, we will break down the Scenarios and a few tips necessary to eek out the most Waaagh! fueled carnage.

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This marks the conclusion of our tale. You can find the first part at The Orange Lights of Altdorf - Part 1.

They circled around through the forest, passing a few houses and farm land that had been burnt to a cinder. The forest would often flash with light as flaming boulders shot skyward. Eventually the trees started disappearing, making way for ruined stumps and vast clearings of smoldering ruin. As they crested the last rise, they stopped.

The valley below them looked as if the earth was on fire. Thousands of campfires blazed, and a sea of bodies could be seen writhing around them. The Greenskins had formed an army unlike anything he could have possibly imagined. The long, deep calls of horns and the thunderous beatings of war drums could be heard. Banners of red, green, and orange all waved from the backs of numerous siege engines. Thousands of voices roared and called into the night. Apparently, the Greenskins had gotten bored with the siege sooner than expected and were already organizing for invasion. Wasting no time, they began their entry.

The black powder supplies were almost exactly where the scouts had reported them to be. They had been piled high in large barrels near the back of the war host, laid carelessly next to mountains of butchered farm animals and raw meat. Nearby, several large giants could be seen curled up and sleeping, along with tiny goblins that scurried around, grabbing what they could.

Using the landscape, they crawled on their stomachs down the hill towards the camp. Jonas was shaking with anticipation as he reached their target. The powder barrels were larger than a man and decorated with strange runes that looked as if they were painted in blood. The nearby mountain of rotting animals made his stomach churn, and for a moment he believed he would retch. He could hear the faint skittering of feet close by, but when he turned, he was only greeted by darkness.

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