Mark Jacobs announces major features cut from Warhammer Online

In the latest of an ongoing series of interviews with MMORPG.com, Mythic Entertainment VP and General Manager Mark Jacobs has dropped big news on the Warhammer Online fanbase: major features are being culled from the game in order to make their Fall launch deadline. In short, the capital cities for the Dark Elf, High Elf, Orc, and Dwarf factions will not be in the game at launch. The Human city of Altdorf and the Chaos Inevitable City will be the only Capital cities in the game. This is an enormous change, seemingly changing much of what we know about the game's core of RvR gameplay.

Additionally, four classes are being removed, deemed to be in a condition unsuitable for launch. They are:

• The Choppa (Greenskin)
• The Hammerer (Dwarf)
• The Blackguard (Dark Elf)
• The Knight of the Blazing Sun (Empire)

As the website notes, all of these are melee classes and two of these were intended to be the primary tanking classes for their race. This leaves the Empire and Dark Elf races without a dedicated tanking career, possibly limiting their contributions to end-game PvE content. Jacobs moved immediately to try to curtail the obvious rumor-mongering: "This has nothing to do with EA ... they had zero input in this ... They don't even know about it. It's not a discussion we would have with them."

We've previously expressed some reservations about just these issues. How do you feel about these major announcements for Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning?