Weekly WAR rollup: Mid-January blues edition

So it’s been a crazy week and I’m just getting back into gear on posting more regularly. Why not start off the week with a fresh WAR rollup?

Yet another reroll looms large

I’ve barely touched my Warrior Priest in the last week and a half, mainly due to having burned out running the Crypts and Tunnels beneath Altdorf repeatedly over the course of  a couple of weeks with very little to show for it (a set of Sentinel Boots from my first run, nothing from the next four runs.)

This mild case of post-40 burnout (which is likely obvious from my post about it last week) has led me to start playing yet another alt, an Engineer, whose paunchy build is now up to Rank 10 (and RR8). And this time I’m really enjoying it, and looking forward to picking up my first tactic and that nifty armor buff at Rank 11 tonight. :) I’ll be posting more about my experiences as a stunty in the next few days, but suffice it to say that I think I may just have to shelf my 30 Swordmaster as my “alt of choice” and keep working on my new grenade-lobber until I start running on fumes with him, as well. There’s just something about being an RDPS class with half-decent armor — and a stealthily (yet stocky) short stature — that’s very appealing. Plus, tossing bombs is just a ton of fun, especially in Tier 1.

Slayers to be announced next week?

The blogs have been abuzz with news of Keen’s not-so-mysterious package for the last few days. Orange hair dye and an electric razor? I wonder what they could be suggesting? Is the next blogger going to receive a pair of hatchets and green facepaint? Is that even legal to send in the mail? :)

It’s interesting that the Slayer appears to have supplanted the Hammerer class, which had made it well into beta before getting pulled back. And from the screenshots floating around, Hammerers had some pretty sweet looking winged headgear going on. On the blog front, Syp has also chimed in with 10 reasons why Slayers are good for WAR, and khayne has some doubts about the appeal of Order MDPS classes, if you’re curious. Unlike khayne, though, I think adding another Greenskin class will be nice for those of us who really want to play an Orc, but really don’t want to be stuck playing a tank when the current end-game is primarily dominated by RDPS…

Seriously, though, haven’t we had enough of Dwarfs (that spelling always gets me…)? We need some new races in WAR that look a little better than Elves and Dwarves. It’s unfortunate that the lore didn’t offer up some more interesting-looking races on the Order side. At least the Slayer has a little character going on, and isn’t another walking beer gut like the other Dwarf classes. Here’s hoping that new races will be introduced in an expansion down the road…

Kudos to Mythic for some excellent blogger relations, though. Good to see that they’re reading at least one WAR blog out there. ;)

How’s about a new mount?

Thulf has a great little post up about some potential alternate mounts for his Black Orc. He’s right, though; there aren’t any money sinks for rank 40 players aside from scouring the Auction House for greens and blues for alts, or buying 300g talismans or dyes for armor you’ll probably outgrow/outrank within a month.

High-end mounts aside, where’s guild/player housing? Where are purchasable upgrades for gear? Where are trophies we can throw stupid amounts of our hard-earned gold at? All due credit to Mythic for focusing primarily on end-game oRvR and itemization issues right now, but if they’re going to spend time building fluff like Keg End or the Witching Hour, I’d really like to see some more options for things to save up for at the end-game. As it stands, I can’t buy gear for myself from the Auction House because the sets are so much better stat-wise now (including set bonuses), AND I can’t get wards from them, which are necessary obstacles to working through most of the end-game progression.

Speedier and/or cooler looking mounts are all well and good, but I want my own house, damnit! :)

Spicing up your WAR experience

There’s been a metric ton of commentary on the upcoming zone domination system in oRvR, the unnecessary nature of battle objectives, how sieging fortresses still kinda sucks, and general griping in general — along with a few great suggestions thrown in for good measure. Regis over at Wizards and Wenches has a post up from last Friday on the subject of “putting the war back in WAR” that I thought I’d shine a light on as well.

In addition to noting Arbitrary’s comments about wanting to pillage more and fortress less, Regis makes an excellent point regarding making warcamps another objective in the fight. I’d love to have the opportunity to seize an opposing warcamp and gain additional resources, quests, and whatnot that I’d normally not have access to. I’d also expect that the enemy would have to run all the way back to get there, which would help a lot from an overall zone domination view.

A little humour to lighten the mood

I figured I’d close this out with a comic I saw over at The Greenskin last Friday. Definitely shows how most Order players feel when thrown into Tier 4, so it’s funny to see the effect from the Greenskin side as well.

Cheers, and have a killer week from the one-man reroller team. :)