Beta Update 2 is out at the Warhammer Herald this week and it’s terrific. It’s packed with information on some of the changes that are currently happening with the game and I found them to be pretty exciting. Here are some of what I found to be the highlights and things that interested me the most:
1. Itemization. How many times have we all been frustrated with getting a quest (or completing one), only to find out that the item rewards are things your class can’t use? It takes a bit of the wind out of your sails and at times you can feel cheated. Or what about the situation where you kill a rabbit and it drops an epic Sword of Doom out of thin air? Or have you ever killed someone in PvP and wished you could be rewarded for that in a tangible way beyond a few more points? Well, Warhammer is aiming to have loot make sense in all of these areas:
What does itemizing a chapter entail?
Well we go through every quest that gives rewards and create 24 quest items for it. Every quest in WAR gives you a choice of reward when you complete it, and those rewards are filtered to only show items that are specific to your career. Then we do the same thing for influence rewards — influence rewards are also filtered in a career-specific way.
Then we figure out all the monsters in that chapter and make sure that they drop loot, and that the loot is level appropriate for that monster. We also make sure that players will also drop loot when killed in RvR when we do this. Then we hook up all the stores in that chapter, including the renown stores – where all the great RvR items can be found.
Afterwards we create all the loot for the three PQs in that chapter. Each PQ boss can drop some very-rare unique items, and some rare and uncommon stuff too. PQ bosses also drop most of the armor-set pieces. If there’s a set piece noted for a PQ in this chapter, we add those items to loot that can appear in the chest. We’ve also been looking at how we give out loot in PQs this week – But that will be in an Update later on by the PQ Team.
OMG! You man I don’t have to worry about meaningless quest rewards?? The career-centric loot rewards for quests and influence rewards is definitely a huge step in the right direction. Now I know going in that every quest is going to yield something relevant and beneficial for my class. It’s no longer the pot-luck, mystery-meatloaf approach to loot rewards.
2. UI and the Map. As you know, I’ve been playing EQ2 lately and one of the “must have” mods that I use there is a great map mod called EQ2 Map. I also used a nice map mod in WoW, the name of which escapes me at the moment since it’s been a few months. But the point is, a good map system can really help you in the game. It is your main source of direction, of quests locations, points of interest, etc. A good map can help you enjoy the game more, while a bad map (the original VG “google earth” map) can really hinder you, or at best is just irrelevant to gameplay.
At GenCon earlier this year I had the chance to have some keyboard time with Warhammer, and one of the things I looked at was the map as I did RvR and PvE. My initial impression was that the maps were decent, but honestly a bit confusing (of course I was playing in 5 minute chunks so that didn’t help). So it was with great interest that I read in the update this week that the team is actually modifying and changing the look, feel, and functionality of this important tool:
Most recently we just overhauled the main map from the ground up. Until this point, we had only zone level maps and then a long list of names of all the zones. Now we have a World map and a Pairing level map, as well as the Zone maps, and a method of navigating between them that should feel very intuitive.
These changes to the system has allowed us to integrate many things into the maps that weren’t there previously, such as the quest tracker (allowing for more fluid waypoint toggling), filters to turn on and off various pieces of information, and by far my favorite, map coordinates. Hooray! Coordinates have actually been very useful to the development process though they were originally designed only for player use, so it just goes to show you how good designs can be pervasively beneficial.
Oh, the maps are now larger so that you can get a much clearer visual picture of what you’re doing, and where you need to go at any time.
Overall the maps are very indicative of the style that we’re going to be using in all of the UI, in particular the parchment graphics, and we’re using the maps in other places that they can help to provide more information to the player. In fact, we’ve just begun integrating the map system into the Tome of Knowledge, so you’ll be able to see a visual representation of your Main map in special key locations in the Tome as well.
As someone who spends a lot of time looking to tweak my UI setup to be the most functional and efficient possible, this is good news to me. The Tome of Knowledge has been one of the features of Warhammer that I think is most unique and will really be cool to see in action. I like the fact that they are tying it in with other core UI elements, and the map certainly makes sense. Some of the functionality they mention seems to be standard these days which is fine, but I’m glad to see that they are taking this downtime to not only add new things to the game, but also improve existing systems and UI elements.
3. Numbers in Tooltips. I thought this final piece was noteworthy due to the discussions you see on message boards and the blogosphere concerning numbers in MMOs. I’m squarely a schizo when it comes to numbers in MMOs. On the one hand, I hate that I have to play the numbers game to try and maximize everything about my character, playing the game with a calculator in one hand the entire time. On the other side, because these games are so number centric and that’s been the modus operandi for so many years, I’ve gotten used to having all of that specific information at my fingertips to know exactly how my character measures up.
So it was interesting to see that Warhammer is apparently moving from the vague to the more specific. Numbers will be in the tooltips when it comes to player abilities:
Some upcoming changes will finally allow us to show you some more of the actual numbers that drive your abilities. For example, a Bright Wizard’s “Sear” will no longer simply say “A basic magical attack“, but will instead say “Deals 18 Elemental damage to your target“, and you’ll be able to see the automatic upgrades that are inherent in your abilities when it says “Deals 47 Elemental damage to your target” a couple of ranks later. Additionally, we’ll have far-more-detailed ability data, including build time, cooldown time, cost, range, requirements, and so on, for every ability.
What that tells me is that this particular beta community was clamoring for more specifics - more data, more numbers. Again, I think people have gotten used to seeing this type of information over the years and they rely on it to benchmark themselves against the game and other players, and to gauge their own sense of progression within the game (whether it be stats, dps, etc.).
Overall, I thought it was a nice beta update, and hopefully one that will cause far less ruckus than the previous update. Go give it a read because one thing I didn’t mention here is how cool the Marauder career sounds with it’s morphing weapon-limbs. 
Entries (RSS)
November 10th, 2007 at 9:35 am - Edit
[…] over at The Server is Down has some information on the Warhammer Beta Update - Part 2. One of the most interesting things to […]