Warhammer Online Call to Arms Interviews

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Written by BuckGB on February 3rd, 2009

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The Land of the Dead opens in June, and Hickman said it consists of approximately two parts. The first is a large, outdoor area that's full of lots of new content, from public quests, monsters, rewards, and more. This all takes place on an area about three-quarters the size of a starting zone, so we're talking a large chunk of geography. (The content will be designed for levels 30 to 40).

The second part is a large pyramid called the Tomb of the Vulture Lord. This is what's called a gated dungeon; factions will battle for access to enter the pyramid. The winners get to go in, while the losers have to wait. However, the winners will only have a limited amount of time to explore before the other realm is invited in. That means battles can erupt inside the pyramid, and teams can be caught surprised, since the place is full of all sorts of devious traps and challenges; you may be busy trying to deal with the tomb's defenders when the other realm suddenly appears from behind.

It all makes for a very extensive rollout, which seems unusual, but there's a reason for that. "We didn't want to call it a bunch of patches," Hickman said.

As much fun as a night of unmitigated slaughter sounds, it probably holds second place to the real beginning of The Call to Arms, a live event called "Bitter Rivals." This, like the Heavy Metal event, will give players a chance to battle in a new scenario. In this case it's a fight for the "Twisting Tower," a close-quarters combat scenario in which players struggle for control of a ruined Chaos temple that floats above a Chaos vortex. Controlling all three floors of the temple offers special rewards, but all players will be able to earn rewards merely for participating, including special titles, new siege engines for fortress battles, and the big prize... a week's head start on the two new careers joining the game. In discussing the Twisting Tower, Hickman mentioned in an offhand manner that another benefit to live events was as a test bed for new scenarios and game mechanics. While he wouldn't confirm that the Twisting Tower would become a permanent part of the game, the possibility remains open.

The real buzz, however, surrounds the introduction of two new character classes, the Orc Choppa and the Dwarf Slayer. These melee DPS classes, cut prior to the game's launch, fill in the last big gaps in the classic RPG class mechanics. At that time, however, the Dwarf class was supposed to be the Hammerer, something Hickman says has been permanently dropped. "We were never really happy with how the Hammerer was shaping up," Hickman said of the decision to drop it. "When we decided to not put it in the game, its Destruction counterpart, the Orc Choppa, had to go with it. We hated that."

We've spent a lot of time preparing for those classes, especially working to prepare for the Slayer. It's just so iconic for our game. The Call to Arms is all about the kings of each faction calling up reinforcements. The story of the Bitter Rivals event leads into the unlocking of these two new careers in early March. As a player you get in and take on quests and tasks, RvR activites, and can finally unlock the new classes about a week early. They'll be available for everyone else a week later than the Bitter Rivals participants.

For those not at all familiar with Warhammer Dwarf lore: A Dwarf Slayer is a dwarf who is somehow dishonoured and seeks a death in glorious battle. It's not suicide per-se, as the Slayer will continually throw himself into battle after battle, doing his best to defeat each enemy, but ultimately seeking a glorious death in combat.

First, I asked how Mythic planned to deal with a career whose ultimate goal is honourable death in a game where, for all intents and purposes, characters never die. How does that convention translate?

(That is the ultimate bend of the lore,) he answered, (because technically in the game you can't ever die. Now, if you want to look at one thing and say we said '˜We're just going to ignore that', just like we ignored other people not dying permanently because we just can't help but do that. No one wants to die permanently.)

So Call to Arms is set to change the face of Warhammer Online in a big way, but Mythic isn't planning on stopping there. Following another major update towards the end of the year, the company will begin looking at a boxed expansion for the game.

"Most likely we will (release a boxed expansion), we're still talking about it, but probably what's in store is something else free by the end of the year, and then I'm sure we're going to put a box on the shelves at some point. All in time and all at the right time. Right now the way we are doing this is exactly how we should be doing things. We've talked about a box, and right now there's a small team that meets once a week to discuss ideas for that, but in general we're all pretty focused on what we're doing right now."

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