Wrath of Herorcs

I've been facepalming so hard my knuckles have eyelids now.


This really wasn't something very hard to notice.


/ragequit

WOH Patch Notes Notes

You can see the notes in their entirety by ...patching the game.

Just a couple observations from things jumping out at me:

• Total character wipe. All our XP, stats, friends - reset.
• Ranged was indeed nerfed from 100' to 65' (except for the Sorceress and Shadow Warrior), a pretty heavy-handed move that definitely changes things for the Shaman, Bright Wizard and the poor Engineer who was already pretty herpadurp. Keep reading below for more on that...
• Fixed a couple issues with targeting that should hopefully help us out. (Yay.)
•  Tactics are disabled this round. (Boo!)
• They've added a meaningless 'Rewards Spinner' at the end of scenarios. Fuck yeah! 

• But this combines two of my favorite things - Mystery and Prizes. I feel like there should be a Wheel of Fortune feature in every game. I'm completely serious.

On to the heroes:

Amenadresh the Lich Priest aka Manny the Mummy:
His damage reduction bubble now is a field that heals allies for some of the damage they deal. His Area-Effect abilities now follow the target enemy and his animations have been tweaked, so hopefully they're less obnoxiously blinding.


This should be a more fun hero to play, but I wonder about how all these debuffers' nasty herpes effects will affect general survivability.

Bax the Black Orc:
Run speed slightly increased.
Wait, what? Increased? He was ... buffed? ...Did ... wait, ... what?

Conrad the Warrior Priest:
Armor, damage and run speed increased. His self-bubble thing now also does AE healing. His second strike-to-heal is now an area-effect radial cleave thing.

Durrig the Engineer, Ikkrik the Skaven Gutter Runner:
Damage has been slightly reduced.
Wait, what? Reduced? They was ... nerfed? ...Did ... wait, ... what?

Also nerfed with damage reductions:
Felicia the Bright Wizard, Ilyana the Sorceress, Korith the Shadow Warrior.
Notice a trend there? Ranged DPS got spanked.

Kaelin the Dryad aka The Tree Chick aka Wood Boobs:
Damage and run speed increased.

Also given run speed increases: Thagison the Slayer, Volrik the Marauder, Nethys the Vampire, Zathis the Assassin.
Essentially, all the melee classes got crackhead speed while all the ranged classes were given bitch wrists.

R.I.P. Crazy Ranged Damage Facemelting. You will be missed.

Meanwhile ...Bax is laughing his big green balls off.

http://laughingferret.blogspot.com/

Thanksgiving Beta-Off

Wrath of Heroes will beat the Old Republic in at least one way this week: it opens earlier.

Beta 3 starts tomorrow around 4pm EST, get an e-z key here from MMORPG.com, who also did a preview of the new map, Black Fire Pass.

"I played with the guys who made the game and they died often and liberally."

They do die a lot, but there's nothing wrong with dying liberally. You get to prolong the inevitable with months and months of ineffective discussion and then you get peppersprayed while you scream "ABORTIONS!"


Wait, that's not what you meant by liberally, is it?

Also: it's fun to watch other games suddenly pull weekend events out of their ass to try to fend off the TOR storm.
Fuck your Jedi, we have ...Clown-nose Corgis.


PS: BONUS:
MMORPG.com is on a roll here:
"TSW is going to take the world by storm and set new standards for excellence"

If by "the world" you mean "a middling niche PC gaming audience" and "by storm" you mean "possibly after months of TOR and GW2 burnout" and if by "set new standards for excellence" you mean "charge them more than any other MMO as well as have a Cash Shop", then yes, I agree.

Massively also played the game some and wrote 25000 words about the experience, hailing it as the new messiah of MMORPGs.

Again, I read the whole thing and I think the key part of the article may be this:

"Funcom"

~

Reader Question: "What would be the best name to pick for the 'Legacy' title underneath your name [in SWTOR]?"
Spider Love: "The Emeril Legacy"

~

I was going to write something original today, but I'm really under the weather. Here are two brunettes.

TOR Notes

The beta client is available for download if you still need it for this weekend and/or haven't checked your mail. Head here and login to start the ball rolling.

TimeKillLinkDump:
http://torguild.net/calculator/
http://www.reddit.com/r/swtor/
http://alterswtor.com/

Couple things I just learned this weekend:

Legacy System revealed

So, you get rewarded for having just one surname for every character you create? Disappoints.

No, wait - that's what made Star Wars so great, wasn't it - all my favorite characters shared the same last name. Luke Skywalker, Han Skywalker, Obi-Wan Skywalker, Yoda Skywalker, Darth Vader Skywalker, Emperor Palpaskywalker, R2-Skywalker, Jabba the Skywalker.


And, I learned this handy pro-tip: You can mouse over dialogue options to reveal which type of points they'll score you, Light or Dark. So, don't just hammer the number keys: Use the mouse, Luke.

*Edit: sifting through the murk of the Legacy system now...

 You can choose to do one of the following [for each character]:
- Display [or Hide] your legacy name as your last name ("Raiel Firewalker")
- Display your legacy name below your name

Raiel
The Firewalker Legacy

Skyrim, Japanese Wrestling, The Tao

Skyrim
I didn't really have any interest in playing this game, but around the 3 minute mark there sold me.

Also, may I interest you in a video of a man getting violently destroyed by a blow up sex doll?

Also, this.

When a superior man hears of the Tao,
he begins to embody it.
When an average man hears of the Tao,
he believes in parts of it and he doubts in parts of it.
When a fool hears of the Tao,
he laughs at it.
If he didn't laugh, it wouldn't be the Tao.

It is said that the path into light is dark.
That the path forward is backward.
That true power seems weak,
that true clarity seems tarnished,
that true resolve seems changeable,
that true clarity seems obscure.

The greatest art is unsophisticated,
the greatest love indifferent,
the greatest wisdom childish.

WOH: Beta Keys, Rune Priest minus the Priestlyness

Couple quick bits here from the Wrath of Heroes :

• PC Gamer is giving away beta keys if you register there. I'm sure they'll fly off the shelf.

• The 17th hero has been revealed: Gromki the Rune Priest. You might remember how I feel about Rune Priests. At least there will be another healer in the game though! ...Wait, he doesn't heal? At all? They added a White Lion that doesn't have a lion and a Rune Priest that doesn't heal? ...O-kay. I've seen worse decisions, I guess.

Let's look at the tiny old bastard's abilities. The 3 debuffs have unlimited durations, which is scary. Essentially, the testers were asking for more healers and instead got a hero that is built to vaporize the 2 existing healers.


Wilford Priestly's Ability List
1: Makes your staff glowy and fires a channeled beam of light at your target, alerting all to your presence and giving them directions on where to find your crusty little ass.
2: Reduce your target's armor by 50%.
3: Reduces the healing your target receives.
4: Your target takes 30% more damage.
5: You can consume your debuffs for a decent pop of damage.

Hope ya like zapzapzap laserbeam spam.

*Note: his range is a pretty middling 65 yards. I'm hoping that's just a by-product of him being a short little senior citizen and not the new max distance for ranged classes. I don't know.

*Note: the playable roster seen in that preview video contains all the 17 'known' heroes so far (the 15 previously playable guys and the 2 new assholes).

Free For All in The Old Republic?

Signs point to yes.

Those who enter Outlaw's Den become flagged for PvP not only by the opposing faction, but by their own faction as well. ...

 The zone contains a slew of the highest level gathering nodes for each gathering profession throughout the area [and] nodes akin to "Treasure chests," which contain Mercenary Commendations -- the currency for PvP'ers to acquire better equipment and supplies

One concern for me is the location - Tatooine - is a zone you're supposed to spend a lot of time questing in - around the mid-twenties level range. Having rabid zergs of level 40's roaming around in the same planet as a bunch of much lower level quest lines is asking for trouble, no?

Also, I thought Ilum was supposed to be the place to be for end-game Open PvP? Now it's like you're giving the side losing in Ilum an excuse to give up the fight and try to farm mats and medals in a less-populated zone.

 The central portion of the zone contains [an Auction House]. 

Sounds like there will be cross-faction trading of goods, like in WoW. Beta testers were saying Bounty Hunters could dress entirely as Troopers, Agents count dress as Smugglers, etc. Doesn't sound stupid or confusing at all.

 A "Pit" area is sectioned off specifically for duels.  

 I don't understand the purpose of explicitly making an area just for duels, most people duel each other right outside the main city or the easiest meeting place between two factions, right?
I don't understand the attraction of a 'duel spot' being put in the middle of a sprawling lowbie zone, in a lake where literally any and every vindictive twat with mommy issues can jump in and interrupt the duels or 4v4's / 8v8s, whatever.

[There will be] rare vendors who sell a variety of unique and distinguished items like rare mounts and social gear. ...items that are likely not found anywhere else in the game. ... You can essentially stroll into Outlaw's Den, clean house with your Guild, buy up everything you need from the vendors, and slay said vendors so that nobody else gets the opportunity. 

Yay, scrubby all-night zerg guilds can swarm the vendor, buy out all his shit and cockblock everyone else by killing him. Sounds swell.

WOH adds a lion-less lioness

Some more hyping from WOH; they're adding a new hero, Aessa the White Lion.
Get a full preview here.

http://isolde.deviantart.com/#/d4bky4t

Observations:

The White Lion doesn't actually have a lion pet, so that's a bummer. (Will there be any true pet class in this game? Squig Herder? Beastlord? No, probably not, unless you count turrets and totems.)

The two draws for playing Aessa will be her soaring Pounce attack and a Bodyguard ability that splits damage between you and nearby allies. Watching the promo video, she looks like she hits fairly weakly and without much variety (1-1-1-2-1-1-1-).

I'm not sure about the visual effects -- there's magic blue crap spitting everywhere and a huge magic lion head made of magic that completely obscures your field of vision.
So, apparently you'll know some rare form of Lion Magic and also, fuck seeing things.



Mythic specifically says they wanted to add melee support because of the way ranged has been dominating in testing. I'm not sure this one Elfess will balance things out much, but they've said there will be changes to help in this area.

This is the fifth female hero (sixth if you count the Dryad), so I'm sure that will make the 2% of the audience that is female playing the game very excited. This is also the fifth Elf,  sixth if you count the Archmage we caught a peek of. I'm not saying there's a trend here or anything, I'm just sayin'.

Mythic also confirmed heroes for Beta 3: the Shaman, Bright Wizard, Witch Elf, Slayer, Dryad and Shadow Warrior.

Including the White Lion and the other heroes seen in the preview video -- Marauder, Black Orc, Sorceress, Vampire, Mummy Priest and Warrior Priest; that's at least 13 heroes with the Skaven, Engineer, Assassin still in the mix, maybe. Also note that the PC Gamer article mentions 17 heroes, so there might be another one, or he added bad.

The WOH Report

Notice the new look for the website, which is heralding the next stage of beta:

• the servers will be open continuously (madness!) from about mid-day Wednesday, 11/23, to about Monday afternoon, 11/29. "It will run for more than 110 hours non-stop!"

*Edit: The huge stress test weekend for SWTOR is Nov 25-28, so... yeah. Hope WOH testers are prepared for some crappy queue times.

Also, be prepared for every shitty Thanksgiving pun possible.

Don't get too sleepy after eating all that turkey, because you'll need to stay sharp to carve up those turkeys in threeway PVP! It's a time to be thankful for the chance to gobble gobble up your enemies and parade your soaring balloon epeen across the mashed potatoes of your foes! Cranberry jelly!


Bold Prediction

Three new Heroes will be introduced.

Vanessa the Transgender Ogre

Panda Warrior

Goblin Monk

Pat Sajak Online

I'd bought a deluxe condo and filled it with chickens. My land was an overflowing orgy of meat-spewing pigs and milk-leaking insects.  There was really nothing left for me to do in the world of Glitch -- I came, I saw, I felt empty inside.

This was not terribly surprising to me, I expected to quickly reach a point where I'd let out long sighs and shake my head for even playing a game like Glitch. What was surprising was that I didn't actually hate every aspect of the game.

The same goes for Marvel's Super Hero Squad Online, another game I tried out which is, by pretty much any measure, pretty fucking awful. But even awful games have their moments. I will try to list these moments, for posterity, because I'd like to justify wasting hunks of my life playing browser games that are intended to do nothing but slough off hunks off your life.


THINGS I LIEKED ABOUT THIS GAMES
by Dr. Spider W. Love, III

Randomly Generated Names

This is from SHSO, which requires that all players choose a 'name' that is randomly generated from an odd word pool of nouns and adjectives and such. This sounds ridiculous, and looks even worse in-game with so many players named 'Silvery Rubber Lumberjack' and 'Bouncy Brown Adventurer'.

The payoff? Continually clicking for a new name until you stumble onto something you like. It's like a game within a game. It might be the best part of the game. It's endgame before the game even starts.

Wheel of Time-Killing

Both these games feature some sort of Wheel of Fortune that you get to spin and win prizes. Are the prizes really great? No. I mostly won spare change and a collection of Mops and Buckets.

But this combines two of my favorite things - Mystery and Prizes. I feel like there should be a Wheel of Fortune feature in every game. I'm completely serious. Add a Wheel of Fortune made of bones and boobs to Age of Conan, I would come back.

Spinach Superjumps

If you eat a leaf of spinach in Glitch, you can do crazy Hulk Jumps and soar across the sky like a bird. This should be in every MMO, period.

Are you writing this down, Blizzard? Superjumping Kung Fu Pandas.


Leaving Your Mark

In Glitch, you can learn to write and leave notes across the world. This isn't overly exciting, but can be amusing if you stalk and torment other players.

"NOTE:

I'M WATCHING YOU, DOUGASAUR. ALWAYS.
YOU CAN'T STOP WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN."

It was equally if not even more rewarding being able to rename the creatures roaming the world. Like being Adam, naming all the wildlife in creation. Except it's just 3 different animals. And it's kind of unsettling to see a flock of chickens all individually named 'Buttsauce Johnson'. But if that's your calling card, if that's how you get your rocks off, then it's pretty fun.

Also, re-naming animals is another way to further harass and frighten other players, such as naming pigs "Dougasaurs Mom" or perhaps naming a chicken "IM COMING FOR YOU DOUGASAUR".

There's also Garden Gnomes you can purchase which can be taught to speak phrases to passers-by, which can be entertaining when used to verbally abuse other players. Dougasaur.

We Can Be Heroes: Greenskin Edition

Here's the beauty of Mythic's Wrath of Heroes:

Almost anything could be a playable Hero. Halfling Fighting Cocks? That could happen. A team of Snotlings working a Pump Wagon? Put that on my Christmas list, because I want it.

That said, I decided to make a list of 8 bad-ass Greenskins you could see in WOH.
Because Goblins and Orcs are awesome, green killing machines and if you don't like them I will literally punch you in your stupid asshole face.

*Note: We've already seen a Black Orc and Goblin Shaman in beta testing and there's a good chance you'll see a Squig Herder and Choppa in the future, so I won't mention them now.



Night Goblin Fanatic
Take your typical, blackhearted Goblin git. Stuff his little belly with Mad Cap, a fungus that gives him the strength and 'roid rage of twenty Mark McGwires. Now give him a huge ball-and-chain weapon and watch him spin into combat like a little green tornado. That's the Fanatic.

Goblin Rider
Here's two things I'd love to see in Wrath of Heroes:
- characters built to fight while riding mounts
- characters that have distinctively different looks with their appearance skins

Squig Hoppers from Games Workshop

Spider Rider

Savage Orc Shaman
Yeah, there's a Goblin Shaman, but that little git is for healin' and stirrin' up the Waaagh! An Orc Shaman would provide something not seen in the mmo - a hulking Orc dps caster melting faces with green laserbeam fury.

Orc Shamans at Games Workshop

Orc Boar Boy
Who would win in a fight between a team of Orc Boar Boyz and a team Goblin Wolf Riders?
Answer: Me, I would win, because I just want to see that shit happen.

Orc Boar Boyz @ Games Workshop

Goblin Nasty Skulker
 Goblins with Stealth are like peanutbutter with chocolate.

"[They] excel at darting forward and stabbing at an enemy's soft spots before slinking away. Such devious gobbos are known as Nasty Skulkers and are generally thought to be 'a bad piece o' work' even by shifty Goblin standards."

" If we iz really really fast, we can even lop of their head or stab 'em in da groin before dey even know wats 'appened."

Nasty Skulkers @ Games Workshop

Orc Raider
I don't know any backstory here, I just know that Orcs Raiders seem to run amok swinging torches in the air and stealing pigs and kegs. Works for me.
Klepto Pyromaniac Orcs sound like my kind of Heroes.

Orc Raider @ Games Workshop

Goblin Warboss
A tiny but oh so armored and 'ard to kill tank Hero.

Orc Arrer Boy
An archer strong enough to shoot arrows that knock you through a brick wall.

Orc Arrer Boyz @ Games Workshop

(*It would be cool to see either an alternate Black Orc or Choppa using a two-handed great weapon).

end of the week linkdump

Here's a GW2 Skills tool calculator thing to play with, if you have not already.
Keep in mind that that stuff's obviously in flux until launch.
Bonus: HD video of Human character creation, which has advanced to freakishly impressive Aion-esque levels.

Lineage Eternal actually looks really playable if you're a fan of Diablo / Torchlight -type games. Check out about a third of the way in where they start showing off their 'drag-and-hold' abilities that you direct by drawing lines with your mouse. I'm fairly excited to kill stuff by making crude, violent stroking gestures.

A Firefall dubstep music video thing.
 and
An overview of MechWarrior Online.

All Fall Down

Some nature porn in the middle of a very warmly beautiful week here in New York.

I was making a can of chili before and the label said Steve and Ed's Original Chili and then there was a big caption that said "NEW AND IMPROVED". How can your Original Chili still be the Original and New and Improved at the same time? That defies the laws of science.

I don't know why I had a can of Steve and Ed's chili. I may have gotten drunk and thought I was buying a carton of Ben and Jerry's ice cream?

I went for a walk to clear my head the other day and there was a cat that had been hit by a car, lying in front of the bank. He was bleeding from his head, panting for air. He tried a few times to get up and walk but he would veer off to the side and collapse in a pathetic heap. A fat lady used the ATM and drove away.

When I came back later, the cat was gone.