World of Warcraft.  Whose older brother’s cousin’s mom’s grandkid hasn’t played this game by now?  Well, three years ago none of us had played it.  We only had the success and fun of the original Warcraft franchise to get us excited about the promise of an MMO set in the world of Azeroth.  Three years, nine million subscribers, and almost two years of my free time later, WoW is still going strong.  In celebration, Blizzard will be running a series of contests and giveaways over the next few weeks.

It’s been three years since players first entered World of Warcraft and took up their roles in shaping its history. In that time, friendships have been formed; wars have been waged; and through incredible feats of coordination and perseverance, some unimaginably powerful beings have been vanquished. To celebrate the third anniversary of the game’s North American launch and to show our gratitude for the ongoing support, enthusiasm, and dedication of its thriving community, we’ll be giving away several prizes over the next three weeks:

• During the week of November 26, we’ll award 10 J!nx gift certificates valued at $100.00 each.
• During the week of December 3, we’ll give away 20 sets of four World of Warcraft action figures.
• During the week of December 10, we’ll provide 5 lucky players with an Apple iPod Touch and a two-year World of Warcraft subscription.

Happy birthday big guy. 

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WAR is coming, but for now, the beta updates keep coming to tide us over.  Beta Update 4  is now out now and with it, some brand spanking new information on the “Career Mastery” system.  As always, there is more information in the notes than what I choose to highlight, so make sure to read them in their entirety.  The two key things I wanted to focus in on were a bit more about this new master system and a further look at world RvR (something near and dear to my heart as you probably know by now).

“So what the heck is the Mastery system??” you ask?  Good question.  If you’ve played WoW you understand the Talent system.  If you’ve played EQII, you know about the Achievement Abilities.  Well, in WAR the Master system is very similar.  It’s the chief way in which you can start to differentiate your character from others of your same career.

Career Mastery will allow players focus on different facets of their career giving them the opportunity to differentiate themselves from others, while still making sure that every character, no matter how they’re specialized, can still perform the basic and fundamental purpose of their career. For example, every Sword Master will be an able tank, capable of absorbing much more damage then a lighter fighter. However someone who specializes in the Sword Master’s defensive path will find that they are generally more durable, able to hold aggro better in PvE and able to defend their friends more efficiently in an RvR scenario. Meanwhile a Sword Master who chooses to go a more offensive route will still be able to take a hit, but may find themselves hard pressed to defend & protect as well as their counterpart, admittedly they will be hitting quite a bit harder as a trade off.

O.k., so far so good.  Pretty basic fundamental system that will be familiar to anyone who’s played MMOs in the last five years or so.  So is that it??  Well, each career will have Core skills that are your fundamental career skills (for example all tanks would have things like taunt and guard).  You gain these core abilities as you level and they improve with level.  They are the automatic, set and it and forget it skills that you get.  Beyond that is where you get into the three different Mastery paths that emphasize different facets of your career, and this is where your choice as a player really enters into things.

Each Mastery contains Base skills, Supplemental skills, and also has its own Mastery level. Base skills are the Actions, Tactics & Morale a player is granted as a reward for achieving a specific level.  Every character of that Career will always be able to purchase these skills, however their total effectiveness is intimately tied to the player’s level of Mastery. Supplemental Skills are the Actions, Tactics, and Morale that a player can only unlock by increasing their Mastery of a given path.  Like Base skills, Supplemental skills continue to increase in effectiveness as you’re Mastery level increases. The Mastery level itself is the current amount of Mastery a player has in a particular path.  Players will be able to choose just how much Mastery they desire in each of the three paths available to them.

Essentially, the Base skills become unlocked as you level, and you simply need to visit a trainer and train them.  Supplemental skills however must be unlocked by increasing your Mastery level.  The trick is, the points (Specialization Points) used to raise your Mastery level are the same points you need to spend on the Supplemental skills that each new Mastery level offers access to. 

These points are referred to as specialization points, and are earned every rank.  A player will never have enough Specialization points to completely Master multiple paths while purchasing Supplemental skills. It is a tough choice b/c every point of Mastery earned improves EVERY action in that mastery line by a small amount this includes the Base Skills you automatically get. One level of Mastery can seem trivial.  However, they add up and 5 or 10 points of Mastery makes a significant difference!

There is some amount of automatic leveling of power for skills in the paths outside of their Mastery. This is done to make sure the ability is not completely useless to the player.  In fact, many abilities may still be useful for secondary effects such as Stun even if they have horrible damage/healing values b/c their Mastery level is lower. When comparing the general power of an ability of a path with 100% Mastery and one with 0% Mastery you will see around a 30 – 35% difference in power. Remember this number can be improved (or widened) further depending on which Tactics and Stats you focus on as well.

So obviously, there is a huge power differential to be gained if you choose to really pump up the Mastery in a certain line and focus on a core set of tactics and abilities versus trying to be a jack-of-all-trades.  Common sense really, as most MMOs tend to favor that kind of focus, so it’s not entirely unexpected.  The real trick will be to see how well all these various skills and mastery paths are balanced.  Will there be true choices to make which can all be viable, or will there end up being “templates” that everyone feels like they have to follow to be most effective?  Confuzzled yet?  If so, head on over to the original article as they give two examples of what they are talking about.

Next, the RvR team has given us some further juicy tidbits, and continues to head in the right direction with RvR as far as this gamer is concerned:

Now for the part that has been the top-secret project the RvR team has been hard at work on: Keeps. Yes, you read that right – we are adding Keeps. Keep warfare, namely protecting your keep and capturing your enemy’s, will play a significant role in open world RvR and the campaign.

The first pairing to have keeps on Beta will be Empire and Chaos. The art for the keeps will not be polished when Beta reopens, but this is very intentional. Our primary goal at this stage is to make sure the game play and functionality of the keeps are very solid and you can expect to see a lot of “focus discussion” posts from members of the RvR Team as we request targeted feedback.

What about Siege? There will indeed be siege in WAR. However, siege will not be ready when Beta reopens. I will have more information for you as we get closer to having it ready for release to Beta.

I can already hear the DAoC veterans cheering in the distance.  RvR was a lot of fun, and keep/siege warfare was a big part of that.  I think this is excellent news and I’m glad they shared this with the player base.  I really feel like the beta tester feedback has really shifted RvR away from scenarios to some degree and back to the open, world RvR.  Scenarios can be good and all, but I think this certainly is the right direction to head in.

Good stuff.  Can’t wait to get back behind the keyboard on this game.  I’m hoping that when the beta re-opens in December that my GenCon priority beta key will kick in (*wink wink*!).  Stay tuned true believers….there’s much more on the way.

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Wow…two nice days of football for me. 

Texas A&M 38, t.u. 30  (gig em Ags!!)

http://scores.espn.go.com/ncf/recap?gameId=273270245

Dallas continues to roll…

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/recap?gameId=271122006

 Awesome.  That is all.  Hope everyone else had a good Thanksgiving. 

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Here’s wishing everyone in the U.S. a safe and enjoyable Thanksgiving Day!  I know I will be spending the majority of day with my family, eating great food, catching up on old family stories, and watching my favorite pro football team hopefully blast the NY Jets.  With a cold front just having moved in yesterday, we’ll have a crisp, cold, clear day to enjoy the holiday.  Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

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I know you have all been waiting with baited breath for my personal thoughts about the Rise of Kunark newbie experience.  I’m sure you’ve seen both Keen and Cuppy’s experiences in the new content, and I have to say I’ve enjoyed it as much as they both have.  So with a solid week to let the gameplay sink in and my mind grasp what I want to say, here are my impressions and thoughts regarding the level 1-20 newbie experience in the RoK expansion.

1. Launch Day:  It was a smooth as a baby’s bottom, at least for me in the newbie zone on Kithicor.  No lag, no server crashes, and not the 1000 Sarnaks that I thought might be crowding the place.  It was like…almost any other day in EQ2 except for the fact that I was piloting a really cool Sarnak character and exploring the new vistas of Timorous Deep.  I have to really applaud the SOE team on how smoothly the expansion launch went.  Not even a hiccup as far as I could tell.  So that really freed me up to focus on the game and enjoy myself rather than spend the evening wishing the servers were up or surfing a technical forum to resolve some new glitch. 

2. The Sarnak:  Cool race!  I had fun in the character creation process for quite awhile before deciding on my final look (I made a Brigand and then later a Defiler).  I like the various options you can select, from various horn styles to scale patterns to colors.  I did wonder for a bit how they would wear a helmet until I finally put one on - it basically lays over your snout, but preserves the unique look of your head and horns.  Good move.  The only thing I had to get used to was constantly seeing my Sarnak hunched over as he ran around.  It’s like they all have scoliosis or something!

3.  Graphics:  The graphics of EQII continue to impress and delight me.  I know that in some areas they need some work (character models of some races), but overall the art direction and style has been a welcome change from my almost 2 years of WoW.  Timorous Deep boasts ocean spray on the rocks, huge cliffs filled with colorful and dangerous fowl (!!), sweeping vistas from atop mountains, huge broken bridges over chasms, ancient temples and much more.  Yes, that’s just the newbie zone hehe.  It was definitely a fun zone to explore from a visual perspective - completely different feel than anything I’d seen to date.

4.  Quests and Leveling Up:  Timorous Deep is designed to take a character from level 1-20 in a story-driven series of quests that explains some of the backstory and conflict between the Sarnak and the Spirroc.  I found the quests to be somewhat easy to moderatly challenging given my level - so all in all I think they were appropriately focused at the right level.  I don’t think I ran across one quest where I thought, “Man, this is tough!”.  That may be because I was playing through the content as a trio vs. solo.  The quest stories are interesting if time is taken to read them, and I ended my journey through Timorous at Level 19, 98.6% to level.  So it was right on target to get me ready to face Butcherblock.  My one complaint is that it had to end at level 20 - you have a 50 level gap before you can really go back and experience the rest of RoK content.  So that’s a bummer, but it does provide some incentive to level up.

5.  RoK Gear:  I must say that the one thing I wasn’t expecting, and was completely amazed by, is the gear that you get out of Timorous Deep.  You get a TON of items from completing all the quests - from armor to weapons to jewelry.  And these items aren’t just your run of the mill newbie items.  These are top of the line stuff for their level - they are loaded with stats, health/power and resists in a lot of cases.  They are so good in fact, that even in the lower to mid 20s we were hard pressed to find any upgrades via Butcherblock quests or even via the auction house.  Now that’s saying something when you are 27 and still using level 16 or 17 items because you can’t get quest rewards that are any better (and in most cases worse).  I’d really expect that more at the higher level, but at the newbie level?  I was pleasantly surprised.  Now I just wonder if newbie gear in EoF and the old world will be revamped at all (a huge task I’m sure).

Overall, I found the RoK newbie experience to be the best one yet - better than Greater Faydark, Darklight Woods and certainly the old world (Antonica).  I continue to enjoy EQII and this expansion just proved to me that SOE is doing a lot of things right.  I plan to enjoy the world of Norrath for many months to come, and I encourage you to give RoK a try.  I’m telling ya, it’s good to be a Sarnak. 

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Life is hard.  Times get tough for people.  What happens to people who play MMOs when the hard times in life intersect with their favorite hobby?  Are MMOs capable of providing an outlet, an escape, a coping mechanism to people who are struggling with some of life’s more difficult issues? 

I know that over the years I’ve seen this happen via the various guilds I’ve been a part of -whether it be financial issues, martial problems, a breakup, a death in the family, the loss of a job or a serious health issue.  Whatever the case, you have people who play MMOs in the midst of the difficult times in life.  They continue to connect with their friends, guildmates, and the game at a time in their life when you wonder how they could possibly hang in there.  Why do they do this?

We often talk about the social aspects of MMOs and that for many of us, it’s the people that keep us playing.  Sure, we want a solid game that’s fun to play that can provide for our entertainment needs.  But we also want to experience it with friends.  The companionship in the journey makes the entire journey worthwhile.  It’s neat to see dungeons and boss mobs and find nice loot, but without that person to joke with and share the experience, it can feel a little empty.

I think that MMOs can provide something that people need in times of hardship and crisis - fellow gamers and friends that also have gone through hard times in life.  The MMO becomes the place to go that’s free from the stress and worry of their current situation, if even for a little while.  Over the years, I’ve seen this happen time and time again as guildmates and other friends have shared, via chatting in-game or on forums, some of the difficult situations they are facing.  The outpouring of understanding, sympathy, support and in some cases tangible help has been amazing. 

We live in a technology saturated world.  The more we grow connected, the more in danger we are of growing disconnected.  But I still see those glimmers of hope in these fantasy worlds we call a second home.  There is genuine human connection behind the screens and beyond the character models. 

Finally - and please hear me clearly - I’m not advocating that people try to escape or ignore RL problems and issues by playing an MMO.  Clearly that wouldn’t be helpful and could cause more harm than good.  In addition, in some cases “addiction” to an MMO has caused serious harm to people’s lives.  But I see far more benefit than detriment, and I think this form of entertainment has more to offer than just a new shiny or a few more levels.

So here’s the question - have you ever been in a tough situation in life and continued to play an MMO?  If so, what were you reasons for doing so?  I’d be interested in hearing your story.

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O.k. so I love to read about the history of gaming, whether it be a particular game company, a certain computer manufacturer, arcade games, or consoles.  So anytime I see a story like that you can be sure I’ll link it up here.  This particular piece I saw mentioned over at Slashdot, and it goes into some of the history behind Bioware - how these guys got started and their gaming history to date.

“For it was in 1995 that this clinical trio turned their back on the rollercoaster world of medicine for the rock solid job prospects of boring old videogames. Most specifically, role-playing games - a pastime that, in its pen and paper form, had kept them amused through medical school. Originally working out of Greg’s basement, and calling themselves BioWare (a medically appropriate name, from the Greek “Bio” meaning from the chemist, and “Ware” meaning stuff), they set about forging what would become one of the most influential developers in the RPG genre. Considering they’ve only been around for just over a decade, and have only produced eight games (plus sundry expansions, of course), it speaks highly of their near faultless track record that the name BioWare has become industry shorthand for state of the art craftsmanship and innovative storytelling. With Mass Effect, their latest and possibly greatest game yet, about to make grown men cry, it seems like the perfect excuse to bring the Johnny-Come-Latelys (not to be confused with Johnny-Come-Minkleys) up to date.”

I’ve played most of the games that Bioware has produced, and it’s one of those companies where you basically buy whatever they produce carte blanche.  I loved the Baldur’s Gate series and played the heck out of NWN.  I have tried Jade Empire and have played maybe halfway through NWN2, but completely missed out on KoTOR (I know…I know…).   Anyhow, I love what this company has produced over the years and really look forward to what they do in the MMO space (and given the speculation, I may get to redeem myself on the whole KoTOR thing). 

You can read the rest of the article here.

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If you play EQII and have a house, you  may be like me - it’s crowded in the extreme!  I have so many pets running all over the furniture, up onto pedastals and globes, tables and beds, boxes and books.  Weapons and paintings hang on the wall and every once in awhile my clockwork scans the room.  Although it’s a mish-mash of Legend & Lore quests, /claim items and a few things bought from the broker, it feels like home.  :) 

However, if you are still looking for some items for your home, or pride yourself on having everything unique and possible in the game, this announcement is for you:

Exclusive EQ2 Offer in Beckett Massive Online Gamer

Limited Edition In-Game Item Only Available Though Magazine

Dallas, TX - November 12, 2007 - Fans of the new EverQuest II (EQII) expansion, Rise of Kunark, have something else to be excited about as Sony Online Entertainment and Beckett’s Massive Online Gamer (MOG) magazine are offering a once in a lifetime opportunity to EQII players and MOG readers. A secret access code has been added to the latest issue of Massive Online Gamer magazine available on newsstands the week of November 28th that will provide all readers with a limited edition portrait of the infamous warlord Venril Sathir. For fans who cannot wait for the magazine to hit the newsstand, the first 1000 people to subscribe to Massive Online Gamer will receive a unique code via email that can be redeemed for the in-game item.

“We have set up a subscription service that will allow new subscribers to get the code almost instantaneously. EQII players can either wait for the magazine to hit the newsstands or get the code now. When you subscribe, you’ll get the code as well as a great discount on our annual subscription,” said Doug Kale, editor of Massive Online Gamer.

Fans of EQII will want to nab this exclusive Venril Sathir in-game item as quickly as possible since it is a limited edition item. This marks the first time that Sony Online Entertainment, the makers of EQII, has offered an item of this level through a magazine.

“We are excited that Sony has partnered with Massive Online Gamer. Our readers are interested in every angle of the massive online community, so rewarding both existing as well as new readers is a tremendous opportunity for everyone,” added Kale.

To subscribe, click here http://www.beckett.com/subscriptions/subs.asp?promotion=294 and for more information about Massive Online Gamer, click here http://www.beckett.com/beckettmog/default.osi.

I will probably be burned at the stake, but I have to admit I have no idea who Venril Sathir is in terms of EQ lore.  But if the magazine looks interesting enough, I might subscribe for that content and get the painting as a side item.  I’d suggest that if this sounds like something you want, that you act quickly.  I imagine they will go fast.

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Well the WAR Herald has put up the third installment of their beta update articles and it’s another good one.  Probably the most interesting piece of it was the information revealed about the current state of the Trophy system. 

As you may be aware, our Trophy system is one way for a player to differentiate their character visually from all of the other characters of the same career. In a nutshell, as you unlock items in your Tome you will gain access to Trophy items that you can place on your character. Up to five trophy items that you can show at once, but you’ll have from 11 to 15 slots to showcase them.

They show a tech demo of a Witch Hunter which highlights the different positioning of trophies on the character model.  So although you can only showcase 5 trophies at once, you can choose from several different options when it comes to where you want them on your character.

As a note, this is just the tip of the iceberg as far as the Trophy system is concerned. Our artists are slaving away so that you will have access to 100’s of trophies to choose from. Just think of the combinations that you can achieve when you have 100+ trophies, five to select, and 11 different locations to equip them. Talk about visual specialization!

I guess there had to be a limit to the amount of trophies one could show on their character due to performance issues I’d guess.  And if there truly are hundreds to choose from, it should provide for quite a bit of variety.  I would guess it would be rare to run into the same character career as yourself, with the same five, in the same layout on the character.  I’m guessing that trophies will be like loot - common, uncommon, rare, epic/fabeled/legendary, etc.  So some trophies may only come through really tough quests, or from sacking a city, or killing a boss mob, or other achievements (i.e. X number of kills).

Next up on the list is what I think will be one of the most interesting parts of Warhammer Online - the Tome of Knowledge.  If you haven’t read much about it, or gotten to experience the game at any of the cons and game shows this past summer, it’s really a nice mechanic.  As you explore the world, the Tome auto-populates itself as you fight new creatures for the first time, discover new areas, complete quests, etc.  I have personally seen it for a very brief time, and not near in what will be its final form, but I found it to be really great.  I love getting achievement xp in EQII, and this mechanic to me is another almost mini-game that gives you that feeling of accomplishment.  So here’s the latest on the Tome:

The Tome of Knowledge has gotten an overhaul and looks absolutely fantastic. We’ve finalized and updated all of the sections in the Tome. Not every section is going to be visible yet (because there are still tons of secrets), but we’ve outlined all the major sections and filled them with lots of really interesting and fun content so that players will be able to spend a lot of time messing around with it. This includes updating the reward systems and letting you know how you got various unlocks.

Previously on the beta, it was a big secret how to get a Title, for example, now we’ll actually tease the events that trigger them so you have a little more guidance going forward. You won’t have all the guidance though; we are trying to keep a lot of things with the Tome hidden, so you’ll have plenty of things to discover when we launch.

We’ve also given the Tome a graphical overhaul and a lot of visual polish. It’s amazing how a few changes to something like the bookmarks makes it feel and look a lot better. The ease of navigation has greatly increased with just some changes conceptually to how the Tome is built. We can’t begin to express how happy we are with where the Tome is now, and how much we’re going to be able keep on expanding it and making it even more interesting.

It sounds like the Tome I saw has undergone some significant changes since August.  Again, it sounds like it will be a great repository for information, for discovery, but also a record of all your achievements and accomplishments to date.  I think (correct me if I’m wrong) that the devs stated that you would actually be able to view someone else’s Tome potentially to see what all they had accomplished. 

So go take a read - there is info about their work on the Elven zones as well as more info on the Swordmaster and Witch Elf Careers.  Good stuff. 

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It’s official.  The servers went live about 3:30 p.m. central time today.  I’m about to hop in and see if I can get into the game along with the hordes of others wanting to see the Sarnak for the first time.  We’ll see how server stability is tonight. 

EverQuest II – Rise of Kunark is now live on all U.S. servers. The sum of many months of hard work by dozens of people on multiple teams comes to fruition today with the release of the fourth expansion to EverQuest II. On behalf of the entire team here at SOE, we would like to welcome you to the Rise of Kunark! Thank you for your patience during the expansion downtime today.

Look for an announcement regarding the international servers shortly.

I’ll definitely be writing up my own reactions and thoughts on the expansion probably next week after I’ve had a chance to play with it for a bit.  But for now it kinda feels like Christmas morning hehe. 

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