Jinx

Wouldn't you know it?

As soon as I have the time to set up my computer to play some well-deserved WAR, it doesn't work. Luckily, I have an engineer of these matters living under the same roof.  All is well now.

After playing on Ehone for about an hour I finally managed to get my oh-so-elusive Darkpromise Footwraps.
The only logical conclusion is that the old house was jinxing me. Many thanks to Anngrek for letting me take her place for the first wing.

And although my return to WAR wasn't the best (what with me missing the renown boost and all) I have teh best guild leader ever.

Ever. He even sings when I ask him to.

Happy Birthday

No, not to WAR, to me actually.

It's my birthday and as a special birthday treat, I am deprived of internet access except at work/school/training/lowsyexcuseforgovernmentfunding.

So, for my birthday, I get to miss the double renown and increased player influx. Go me.

iPhone Birthday Cake

Freak on a Leash

Magus changes. Yes indeedly.

So, what I know of it is:

• For Engineers, a portion of the character's Ballistic Skill, Weapon Skill, and Wounds from equipment will also affect their turrets.
• For the Magus, a portion of the character's Intelligence and Wounds from equipment will also affect their daemons. Additionally, the daemons' autoattacks will now deal magical damage - Elemental for the Pink and Blue Horrors, and Spirit for the Flamer
• For both careers, the character will begin receiving a new effect while they remain near their turret / daemon - Improvised Upgrades for the Engineer, and Unholy Empowerment for the Magus. This effect will start as a +4% damage buff, and will increase every 2 seconds by another 4%, up to a max of +20% damage after 10 seconds. If the character moves away from their turret / daemon, the effect will begin dropping back down, eventually fading from them entirely until they return to their turret / daemon's side. 

So my biggest doubt was: just what does "near" and "away" mean?

I found a non-answer.

"The actual range of the turret buff was omission by intent. We're still debating internally what the actual range should be. "

Andy Belford

Another interesting question was "Will redeploy reset the timed buff?", to which the answer was:

"As long as you're staying near the turret/daemon, the buff will build up; if you move away, it'll drop off.  If you move away and then Redeploy the turret to you, you'll see it start to drop off a bit and then promptly begin building right back up again once the turret "lands".

Nate Levy

And so I've heard say "boohoo, so not enough. I have no reason to spend 2s cast time and God knows hosw much AP (cuz I don't) to summon a meat bag that might give me a small dmg boost if it survives the flow of melee BWs inc to my position"... or something similar. Well, I think its's only fair tro stress out some other things that were disclosed. And I paraphrase:

• This does not involve tactics at all; the damage bonus is a passive benefit of having a turret / daemon out.
• Giving the magus/engy access to a loner tactic is not something that we're looking into at this time
• A network of multiple benefits (like a different aura based upon what you are doing) is something that we're more likely to do as a tactic - we are intentionally aiming to keep the passive effect clean, simple, and straightforward. Additional effects with more subtlety and/or complexity are definitely a possibility for future changes, but aren't necessarily our goal with this specific design.
• It's possible that buildup and/or duration timers may be adjusted in the future, but it's not on our plate right now.
• I currently hope to have these changes in 1.4 (with the caveat, of course, that plans and timelines are always subject to change as needed). I make no statements as to whether "in 1.4" is before or after RVR packs. =)
• Going after the enemy's turret / daemon should be a valid strategy to try and hinder them, as long as the turret / daemon has enough Hit Points to ensure that someone going after it is really focusing on it, rather than just tangentially happening to kill it via incidental splash damage.  Ultimately, much of the number-tweaking will be impacted by PTS results and feedback.

That's all I had time and patience to read but all of these statements (coming from Nate Levy) give me hope for the future. We can rest assured that our cries of "LOL Magus iz gimp" have reached the developers' ears and even if you don't consider these changes to be enough, at least there are changes which means its not a stagnant career like, say, a While Lion (*snicker*snicker*).

Cmon, we all have a WL in some server going like:



Healing Tips: Part 1

1. For fast renown, heal ppl when they jump off keep walls.
2. Just throwing HoTs around when in a funnel and you've got your entire party of MDPS/Tanks under oil is NOT OK.
3. When being targeted by anything never run to the other healers. Run near a tank or a dps that can help kill it, or else they will just jump from killing you to killing the next one.
4. Refrain from using your knockbacks except when absolutely necessary. Targets shold not be made immune to tank punts.
5. Position yourself, whenever possible, away from ledges and with your back to a wall.
6. When in doubt, ask for help

i'll take some RvR to go, please

As you all know there's been some info roaming around about the soon(?) to come RvR packs.

There's bits and pieces about this scattered all over the place. Enough to get my mind crunching some ideas, but not nearly enough to give us definitive knowledge about the stuff.

It's obviously Skaven themed. That much Andy and Carrie have disclosed and it's one of the few questions that they have openly answered.

Andy put up a thread on the official forums for people to ask questions and he's been answering them (you can read it here) and I find it funny that he openly says "no" to subjects like the racial capitals, but he says "we are not ready to discuss that" to things like fortresses.

One thing is for sure, I was thinking of how cool it would be to bring the Fortresses back but in another area, and have them host relics like the DAOC ones, but he already said that there are not going to be Relics as they don't want to give the strongest side even more power =(

What follows is a rant about what I'd

love to see as the result of 1.4 and the RvR packs. It's based on the information that I've read online, but it's more of a wishful thinking rant than a factual future.

According to the concept artwork (that you can see above) the new skaven area looks like it could be a network of underground tunnels.

Add to that the fact that they say the new area is going to be part of the campaign.

Also, on the forum thread i linked to before, one person asked "where is the new area gonna be situated on the world map?" to which Andy answered "it's going to be on the world map" (or something in those lines)

At first i thought he was making a smart remark, cuz obviously everything on the world is on the world map... but then it got me thinking...

what if the new skaven area is BELLOW everything we already know in T4??

think of this... there are 3 pairings. each with 3 zones. making a total of 9 T4 maps that are RvR enabled.

The new area could simply be a chain of tunnels that go underground, bellow the T4 as we know it today, linking all tiers and all zones together. A mesh of pathways that have diferent exits for each one of the 9 maps we have today.

They also told us that they are keeping the keeps and the BOs but they're gonna change the way the campaign advances, and that they're removing some of the locking mechanisms for the zones.

AND they wanna break off the zerg.

So. with all this in mind, my idea is as follows.

Imagine there are no zone locks. Only Pairing locks.

to lock a Pairing, you have to controll all BOs and Keeps on that pairing.

but the zones themselves do not lock. and you don't need to advance from Chaos Wastes to Reikland to lock the pairing.. you just have to controll it all, but in no particular order.

Let's consider that destro starts taking keeps and BOs in Chaos Wastes.

We take both keeps and all BOs.

We don't lock the zone cuz they don't lock anymore

We decide to move on to Praag, so we send some Warbands there to take the keeps and battle objectives BUT!!! we must leave some warbands behind in chaos wastes to defend the already controlled keeps and BOs because Order could just run back and take them away from us.

BAZINGA!!!! the zerg is broken. we need to split our forces to be able to defend shit :P

Now.. we manage to take control of Praag as well, and we try to advance into Reikland, but there's order there.. so we end up having a big fight... and obviously, as order is there, people in Chaos Wastes come up to help... leaving just one warband to defend Chaos Wastes (you twats.. you're gonna lose us a zone!!)

all of a sudden... ZOMGFACEPALM!!!!

a warband of Order goes un-noticed through the skaven tunnels. they go right into Chaos Wastes, where there's only a warband of Destro there trying to defend everything... MISTAAAAAKE!!!

all of a sudden there's order in chaos wastes and in reikland.. and Destro is sandwiched between those two zones... the shaaaame.

only way destro could have prevented this??? by having a warband of destro controlled skavens roaming in the underground tunnels, trying to catch order as they were trying to sneak by!!!!!

so. bottom line is.

no more zone lockings.. you can controll any BO and Keep freely of zone locks, and if you manage to capture all of them, you lock a pairing.

underground tunnels that you can use to stealthly go from one zone to another zone, and the oposing faction can try to block your way by playing skavens

that's what i'd like =)

Creamy Glory indeed.

oh yhea, on another note. to use the tunnels you'd have to gain access to them. the side that has access to them can roam them freely, and the side that doesn't have controll can only go there as skavens, to prevent the other side from using them.

that's all

cheers

Zealot: Path of the iPhone®

Yes, after 25 years someone gave me a nickname.

So, I've been asked about my specc a lot lately. Seems that when you start edging closer to rr70 ppl start taking you more seriously. Not that my healing has changed much but there you go.

My specc looks like this with 3 more points spent in the alchemy tree (wardb doesn't account for the extra specc points you get with every 10 rrs). Bear in mind that the Warping the Spirit tactic has had its effect changed and now makes Tzeentch's Cordial have a % (20%?) chance to increase the target's armour for 1056 and reduce his armour penetration by 10% for 10 seconds. This chance applies with every tick of the HoT so, with a bit of luck it will refresh itself down to the last tick.

I'm now the proud owner of 2 Tyrant pieces: the shoulders and the belt. Still wearing Sentinel chest piece (Assasin's Suit or whatever it's called. The one that looks like a BW on its appearance) mainly because I'm only rr68. And Darkpromise never drops for me. Ever. Hands and boots are Warlord and I'm wearing a spiffy Cowl of the Fist with a Mask of the Bloodletter appearance. Wicked. I've got all 4 ToVL glyphs, the semi-crappy LoTD cloak, a rr65 SC weapon and a rr55 SC focus.

------!! SELF-INTERVIEW TAIIMMEEE!!!11eleven!-------

Q: I've heard Zealots are better off focusing on ST (Single Target) healing and not group heals. Why did you go for Dark Rites?

A: I would rather have my groupheal crit everyone for 2.5k than take as long a cast time on an Elixir of Dark Blessings for a possible 5k for the simple fact that the only thing taking a serious beating that can wait that long is a turtling tank. Also, bombing being a very current problem I gotta face the fact that every single person in my party is likely to be hit at exactly the same time. So, yes, Zealot's ST is VERY good and VERY strong, especially because, unlike the Shaman (the DoKs don't even count for ST when not dps specced), Zealots can specc specifically for ST but grouphealing is essential especially if you find yourself being the only healer in your party.

Q:Would you bet on Willpower or Wounds for survivability?

A: Tricky. I'll be the first one to admit it, I'm a very squishy Zealot. Mostly due to the fact that I stacked Willpower until I had it softcapped without my Willpower buff. Still, if I'm running with a good group that will assist me when I'm targeted, squishiness is no longer much of a factor. Also, they might say Shamans excel at survivability and DoKs have better armour but Zealots have Embrace the Warp (not to be confused with Warping Embrace even though the icons appear to be the same). Yes the cooldown is terrible but, odds are, after you use it Order will just give up on you. Another thing crucial to upping your survivability is location and spatial awareness, but more on that later.

Q: What stats are most important for a healing specced Zealot?

A: Willpower primarily (no-brainer that one) and Healing crit. Healing crit is essential and is actually something I'm lacking. At 23ish% I'm still nowhere near where I want to be (please God, Mythic, anyone, I need those DP boots. If they were to magically appear in my mailbox I wouldn't tell a soul. I swear!) It's essential not only for the obvious reason (you heal more, duh) but for 2 of my tactics: RB (you get AP back on healing crits) and BoC. With RB proccing off groupheals I can pretty much spam DoP nonstop and throw TCs and a LA around and not even care that my AP ritual doesn't apply to me. BoC just makes healing all around that much easier. It also makes my FoC crit for over 1k with just 8 points spent in Alchemy. For an insta cast cheap heal that's just awesome.

Q: Is it worth it buying more than one Ritual? Like say, the AP and the DR one?

A: I would have to say no. It's just not worth a specc point imho. If you feel your regular healing isn't cutting it, I'd go for the healing one. If you can do ok without it go for the AP one. It will make your party kill stuff faster. This "stuff" includes stuff hitting you.

Q:What about for PvE? Are Zealots any good at PvE healing? What specc do you go with when healing LV or ToVL?

A: Zealots are the quintessential PvE healer. We have so many useful things for PvE, it's scary. The selfres is useful when you wipe, obviously. You can up a tank's wounds for 60 seconds which is useful for bosses that have a hard first strike. The new Warping the Spirit works wonders because of the extra armour. Tzeentch's Talon helps a ton with dps races and so does the AP ritual. And if you're ST specced PvE is where you'll truly shine as a steady flow of Elixirs can keep your tank up against almost anything.

Tactics wise I only swap something out to slot in Subtlety, seeing as Guards are better spent on something other than me and I dont wanna die. I don't bother respeccing to ST for PvE anymore. Just not worth the money and my specc is good enough atm to handle both situations.

Q: What would you say is the Zealot's biggest fault?

A: Until 1.3.6 I would say it was its complete lack of dps viability when healing specced. Now, I really couldn't say. I haven't tried turning my Harbinger on at all, seeing as I don't need to damage anything. For leveling a Zealot, it might have been a good change but, then again, I don't know any Zealots who are PvE solo-leveling so it's true usefulness is lost on me. At the moment, I'm completely satisfied with how things work on my Zelly.

Absent Sara is absent!

Chicken Chaser

We still haven't moved. Turns out the former owners had this fetiche about nails ad drills so in the smallest room of the house you can find more than 30 holes drilled in the walls. Painful.

And my mother's cat decided to jump out of a 5th story window. She lived but running to and from the cat hospital has been another adventure.

And yet, amidst all that I rolled something I'd never rolled before. A tank.

I deleted my Chosen and rerolled Blackguard. Ooooh he's so sweet. He can take on anything and nothing can take him. Watch them run in fear when I break loose of the snares and taunt them. I get it now, the whole "over-extending" thing. You're all forgiven.

I have to say this as well. I'm very happy with this new guild thing I found, this Skill Frenzy or what was it. Things are going well. As I always say, "Frenzy provides" and I've been doing my best to provide as well.

I have been on plenty non-fail LV, VL, BE/BB, BS runs (but still no boots. shock. horror.)

We fail at sense of direction though and got lost on our way to Altdorf. We ended up in this strange place where we were afflicted with a strange plague.

By the way, loving the new appearance thing. I can now dress up as a Blood Wizard, or a Bright Letter. Something. However the game is still showing some unacceptable graphic bugs. Not mentioning that Chosen shield that always seems to be facing inwards, you have the WH outfit which... just doesn't look quite right.

Ok, well, I'm off to go tank stuff in the face and winge a bit because I got shot.

My tetanus shot was 2 years overdue.