Portal is free on Steam until May 24th. It is a really fun game if you have not tried it yet.
http://store.steampowered.com/freeportal/
Archive for May, 2010
1.3.5 currency values -Warhammer Online
12
May
With the devalued currency, it appears Mythic is attempting to drastically reduce the rate at which Royal crests are obtained.
For a baseline, consider that right now on live since stage 2 was doable, a stage 2 king kill earns you 6 royal crests + multiple chances are Sovereign drops. 6 Royals on live are equal to 30 royal crests after the new patch.
After the patch, a full stage 1-3 clear after a city flip will earn you 5x crests without a loot timer, or 3x without. Remember, this is the new conversion, so thinking in terms of live, a full city win will give 1 royal crest or 0.6 of a royal crest if you have a loot lockout. A pretty drastic decrease?
A single Sovereign chest piece after the patch will cost 175 royal crests at the new value, or 35 (x5) stage 3 city wins, assuming you only go when your loot timer is clear.
Notes:
-A bag, of which ~6 drop per stage 3 contain 10 royal crests and golds contain a chance at a sov piece you may not have.
-Your realm mates can opt out of the city loot, giving you better odds at a bag. However, unless you are close with them all, the change to make all tokens = 1 officer token may decrease the likelyhood people will opt out. Also keep in mind that other crests are also being devalued making them much more in demand, so if 1 royal = 1 warlord = 1 invader = 1 conqueror. General population people are going to be grabbing at crests where ever they can.
Players drop royal crests in groups of 5. So while crest drop rate afaik has not been increased, you are more likely to win a royal crest from pvp, but you need to win a crest 5 times to equal 1 crest on live.
-Sovereign until changed is still not being used due to being less effective then other sets for many classes, which reduces the impact of the devalued crests.
-The new city is a lot of fun, so it will not seem as much of a grind as if this change was made in the old city.
Stage III
Winning Realm:
Without Reward Lockout Timer: 5x Royal Crests
With Reward Lockout Timer: 3x Royal Crests
Losing Realm:
0x Enemy Realm Champions Defeated: 1x Royal Crest
1x Enemy Realm Champion Defeated: 1x Royal Crest
2x Enemy Realm Champions Defeated: 2x Royal Crests
3x Enemy Realm Champions Defeated: 2x Royal Crests
4x Enemy Realm Champions Defeated: 3x Royal Crests
As a result of the changes to the City Public Quest reward structure we have adjusted the lockout timers for Stage 2 and 3 of the City Siege.
**Important 6v6 Change!
09
May
All teams need to have their captain or scheduler sign up on a very small scheduling forum I have created. http://6v6.backseatdev.com
Things have changed a bit, you still need to have an exhibition game to continue, but I am adding in a set date/time for a match now. On the scheduling forums, team captains have ~36hrs to post up blacklist day/times and suggested date/times for their match. I will do the best I can combining the two summarized schedule and set an official date/time. Teams may still do their match at any time, but if the official time is missed, I cannot promise anything for continued scheduling of the team that misses it.
Teams will need to be more flexible in both time, and in subbing people in to make this work.
6v6 Update – 6 days in
07
May
Alright, so I admit things are not going awesome so far. Scheduling has not gone well it seems and unless everyone was waiting till the weekend to run matches, everyone fails! haha.
I am refocusing the scheduling system in the next couple days to try to help out teams that have been unable to get matches in. I still want to get the next round started, but no one can play the next round until they complete a exhibition match.
Keep your eye on this site, double your efforts to get your match done and I will hopefully have some new options and some tools for team captains to use.
If you have any feedback on the problems with why your match hasn’t happened yet, it would help a lot if you let me know. Also, teams that are not getting their matches in for whatever reason may need to be replaced, so if you have a team you want in, email me as well. tyanon@backseatdev.com
1.3.5 City Seige Tidbit – Portal Flags!
07
May
Now, when you respawn after dying in the city seige, you can quickly port back to control points on your map by clicking the flags. The flags in this screenshot are a bit hard to see, but you should be able to see 4 of them. They have giant red blurs above them. If you highlight over each of them it will tell you what point they port to, then walking up to them and clicking on them takes you there. This lets you and your group/warband get back to where you need to as quick as possible. The pace in the city is fast! So get back asap!!
1.3.5 City Map changes with color!
07
May
Check out the new city map, colour coded directions. Maybe not a huge thing, but much nicer then before!
Attention Zealots/Runepriests! 2 great addons to try out
04
May
Recently I tried out a couple addons a zealot from IR created. Both seem very good.
Markbuff:
This handles your mark buffing/rebuffing. The interface lets you setup defaults for each class and has an override so you can setup what char in your group gets what buff, its simple, takes seconds to setup. Then it has 1 small box on your UI, it shows the people missing buffs, and clicking the box cycles through the people and casts the appropriate buff on them. I really can’t say enough about it, its amazing.
http://war.curse.com/downloads/war-addons/details/markbuff.aspx
Buffhead2:
This is another great addon and while you can set it up with a number of features, I have it tailored right down. It shows debuffs I can remove from people, and buffs on me, like the tyrant proc etc.. It also shows the 2 immunities on people, so you know when your mez and silence is going to land for example. It puts these buffs as little icons above peoples head, so you can run around and see it all visually.
http://war.curse.com/downloads/war-addons/details/buffhead-2.aspx
“whispers hints assumptions” – Warhammer Online
03
May
There is a lot of speculation going around about the reasons for the announced change to allow characters on both sides of a server in 1.3.6.
For the most parts, people seem split between 2 different theories.
1) Server Mergers – Further server merges would run players out of options for characters on different sides on different servers.
In my opinion, this is the least likely option. I see this as a pretty huge change to the fundamentals of the game, but it is also easily implemented and does not affect any in game systems etc.. If I was planning to need something like this for server merges, I would implement it as needed, not announce it as something coming up in the future, where it is then pretty set in steel. Taking an optimistic approach to the game, you would think Mythic would be hoping to maintain or grow their servers, not shrink further. So really, anyone thinking this is a plan for server merges 3-5 months down the road, is taking a pretty unfavourable thought process on this games life.
2) Expansion + Third Faction – People can help fill the third faction on the server they are apart of.
In my opinion, as unlikely as this seems, to me it seems the most believable. I know for a fact that Mythic does not feel a third faction is out of the question, but it is no easy task by any means. Even with Bioware being part of the overall team for making an expansion happen, resources at Mythic seem perhaps a bit constrained for such a large undertaking with such a huge risk. The risk may be worth the reward though if it can be done properly and be a big enough change that players come and gone will look at it as a significantly changed game and try it again. Warhammer has continued to improve from patch to patch, albeit slowly.
For a great read on theories that this last patch has had whispers and hints of an expansion to come, my friend Mykiel has a must read post that he put a lot of research into. I think it is very possible he is onto something! http://mykielwar.wordpress.com/2010/04/22/a-method-to-the-madness/
BSD 6v6 Exhibition Week
02
May
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
See this status page for the latest updates and late entries!
http://www.backseatdev.com/6v6
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Note! We had a late entry
Welcome to the first BSD tournament. The format is 6v6 and we have 5 teams from each side entered.
The first week is a bit of a test period, everyone gets a chance to see how scheduling works, see how the arena works and we have a chance to modify things a bit before going into elimination rounds if need be.
Exhibition Week (May 2nd – 9th)
O1 vs D5
O2 vs D4
O3 vs D2
O4 vs D3
O5 vs D1
O1: League of Extradinarily Gay Gentlemen – Nordain
O2: *Sons of Sigmar – Brohendas
O3: *Team Stealth – IncomingRay
O4: Girls Next Door – Ouro
O5: Third faction – Isego
O6: Team Pedobear – Ary
D1: Team Mango – Rikker
D2: Team Sexy – Sebastiana
D3: Team MDK – Evilgardener
D4: Team Ruination – Skala
D5: Team Laphraoig – Tyanon
*Unset Team Name. Need more information
Playing Matches
1) Get a hold of the other team captain (let me know quick if you are not sure how to contact the other person, I will try to get you an email or something)
2) Figure out a date/time
3) Email me your time just in case of conflicts (tyanon@backseatdev.com)
4) Find your team coordinator
5) Contact me if any issues with scheduling come up and I will see if I can mediate.
6) Make sure your team knows the rules!!
7) Games start on time. If your team is still not ready 10min after the start time they either go anyways with what they have, or forfeit. At the other teams discretion this can be flexible.
Report back results of each game.
Everyone on your team MUST KNOW THESE FEW RULES!!!! -1mil DKP if anyone tries to claim they didn’t know.
Armor/Weapons
Any armor/talismans etc.. is fine.
Spells/Abilities
Anything is fine. Including self rez etc..
Consumables
Anything goes, including but not limited to: Armor pots, Liniments, banners, rez pots.
Arena Zone
The Maw: Everything between the outer walls and the inner keep. No one enters the inner keep and no one goes up on the outer walls or stairs. Everything else is part of the zone and you may use any obstacles or open area as you see fit.
Start/Reset area:
-Order team starts outside the fort at the middle door in South Maw.
-Destruction team starts outside the fort at the door in North Maw.
Winning Criteria
A match, at least for preliminary rounds will be win 2 out of 3 games. Finals may be 3 out of 5.
To win a game, you need to wipe the other group completely. You will be told when you have won by your coordinator.
Time Limits for preparation
When your group is reset back in the starting area between matches, you have 3 minutes to rebuff and be ready for the start call. There is no respeccing/leaving the zone between matches. Any longer cooldowns is not a concern during this phase and will not be accomodated.
Spectators
While I would love to have spectators, it is just too much work, so match times will be a secret and only known by the two teams scheduled to compete. It is expected that players participating follow this rule.
Subs
In the interest in actually doing this, and with the complexity of scheduling etc.. Subs will be allowed as long as they are not on other teams. Please use this only for scheduling purposes, not rigging groups for who your against.. Try to stick as close as possible to your actual group.
Match Stalemate
If teams have not engaged each other by ~5min mark, the coordinators may force both teams to go to a smaller area (such as the east or west side of the fort) . This will be defined better.
Coordinators
We will need 1 person from each side (a rezzer) to come out and help start, reset and end the match.
The communicators need to be able to be in contact with each other during the matches. IRC/Vent/MSN, doesnt matter.
-They will give instructions to begin
-Let the other coordinator know when their sides team is completely wiped
-Rez up any players
-Will stay out of the way. Inside the inner keep of the fort at all times while a match is going on.
-Your coordinator can be anyone, but try to get someone from IRC as that makes things a lot easier
Teams will be expected to find a coordinator.
Good luck to everyone, and try not to be jerks or this is gonna crash and burn fast!