tactics
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WoW minis are out
As predicted, the WoW Minis game from Upper Deck has launched -- starter packs and booster sets are now available at a collectible store near you. I got to play the game with one of its designers at BlizzCon, and I actually found it a lot of fun -- it's very much like a turn-based Arena match, though there are fewer abilities to choose from, and if your characters are killed, they actually come back, as the victory is points-based, not just a deathmatch. But it's very similar to Arena matches in that you spend points on abilities, terrain can help or hurt, and each class has its own counters and tactics.I found it to be a lot of fun, and probably would get involved in it if I had a friend I could also sucker into it, but no dice so far. Plus, it's two hobbies in one -- not only do you get a fun strategy game (that's surprisingly versatile -- you can play with more than two players if you like, and your victory points requirements are based on your characters, not the opposing sides', so you can play with whatever characters you like), but you also get to collect some cool minature reproductions of some of Warcraft's most famous faces. Good deal. Have you checked the game out yet, or is it something you're interested in?%Gallery-33212%
The Colosseum: Apox, Warlock
The Colosseum takes us inside the world of the Gladiator (Brutal, Vengeful, Merciless, and otherwise), to interview some of the top Arena fighters in the battlegroups. Our goal is to bring a better understanding of the strategy, makeup, and work that goes into dueling it out for fame, fortune, and Netherdrakes.Last week, we talked to Ryzer, who is a member of an unorthodox 3v3 Arena team. In that bracket, it's not uncommon to see Warlocks and it's not uncommon to Druids. What is much less common, however, is the Two Warlock, One Druid makeup of SUPER CUTIE FEAR SQUAD. (The caps are theirs, not mine.) In a bracket of Arena often reserved for Rogue-teams (including the feared Rogue-Mage-Priest composition), the over-time based gladiators have achieved the 10th ranking on their battlegroup.After Ryzer's interview, several folks dropped me a line wanting to know more about this team. The good news is that Apox was also able to interview with your intrepid WoW Insider staff. Check out what he had to say behind the cut.
The Elves of WAR: Disciple of Khaine levels 11-15
Levels 11 through 15 for the Disciple of Khaine --much like the other classes -- give you your three first Career Tactics. These passive abilities allow you to slightly alter the way your class functions in combat. However, at this level you're only allowed to slot one Career Tactic at a time. One of these first Tactics increases your survivability by improving the effect heals have on you by 10% -- it's shared between the other Dark Elf classes, too. However, the other two Tactics are aimed at increasing your damage output in two very different ways. Divine Fury boosts your overall damage by 25% at the cost of reducing your healing effectiveness by 20% and Khaine's Blessing bumps up your auto-attack speed by 50% every time you land a critical hit.Your rank 2 Morale is much more interesting, though. It hits every enemy around you for 80dmg and then heals your entire group for the total amount of damage dealt. Having no range, you only need to make sure you've got a nice bulk of targets in the near vicinity. Combined with the Divine Fury tactic, you can actually heal a bit more than normal with this particular attack, too.
EVE Evolved: Speed rebalanced
In a previous article, I examined the nano craze and how speed-fit setups were taking over EVE Online's PvP landscape. In a recent devblog on the issue, CCP developer Nozh makes it clear that the nano craze will soon be coming to an abrupt end. In his blog post, Nozh outlined the current problems with speed setups and laid out his plans to address those issues. The proposed changes cover everything from stasis webs and microwarpdrives to warp scramblers and nanofibres.The nano solution?:The essence of the nano problem is that speed fittings allow some larger ships to perform the roles of smaller, more specialised ships. Heavy assault cruisers are routinely spotted using their speed as a complete defence, something ordinarily reserved for fragile interceptors. One of the core design goals of the change is to eliminate this ability entirely, forcing pilots that want high speed to use ships that were designed to have it. As was the case before the nano craze took hold of EVE, the new kings of speed will be interceptors and frigates rather than expensive heavy assault cruisers and recon ships.With this potential solution to the nano problem on the horizon, PvP in EVE is facing some major changes. In this speculative article, I analyse how the upcoming changes will affect PvP if implemented.
Speed kills
EVE Online has evolved into a game where being fast and agile allows you to choose your fights, dictate range and thus control the course of the battle, disengage whenever you choose, and often move so quickly that you're largely unassailable. However, the era of the nano craze will soon be coming to a close, according to EVE Online developer CCP Nozh. His latest dev blog addresses the insane velocities achievable, even by previously lumbering battleships, with combinations of speed modules, rigs, pirate implants and performance-boosting drugs. (For those less familiar with EVE or its more deviant aspects, you can in fact use and sell drugs in the game.) CCP Nozh outlined the dev team's design goals in stemming the speed crisis:
The Colosseum: Aelli of Reckoning, Quad-boxer achieves #1 Arena spot
The Colosseum takes us inside the world of the Gladiator (Brutal, Vengeful, Merciless and otherwise), to interview some of the top Arena fighters in the battlegroups. Our goal is to bring a better understanding of the strategy, makeup, and work that goes into duelling it out for fame, fortune, and Netherdrakes.You may have heard of him. Jeff "Aelli" Ware of the Reckoning battlegroup has been rocking battlegrounds and the Arena, scoring a Gladiator rank in Season 3 during the last week of play. And as Amanda told us at the beginning of the season, Aelli planned to do even better in Season 4. And now, he's succeeded at doing just that -- Lookin for Sponsor, Aelli's team, has hit the #1 spot on the Reckoning 5v5 ladder. What's the big deal?Not only has Lookin for Sponsor achieved something pretty cool -- they've done it with only two people. Aelli pilots the team's four Shaman all by his lonesome. He's what's known as a "quad-boxer" or "multi-boxer," and controls four of the team's five characters. We were fortunate enough that Aelli was willing to do an interview with your intrepid WoW Insider team, and share some thoughts on both his unique playstyle, and the Arena as a whole. The interview is after the cut.
MMO MMOnkey: Comparing active attack and auto attack
In the opening sentence of a previous column I compared Age of Conan's active style of combat in which the player must instigate every attack with a keypress to the auto-attack combat common to most MMOs. I characterized auto attack as a go-make-a-cup-of-coffee type of combat which, as one commenter pointed out, was a bit of hyperbole designed to accentuate the difference between active and auto attack but which offended several other people who thought their combat skills were being denigrated. The earlier column had nothing to do with styles of combat but all the combat-related comments got me thinking about some of the differences between active and auto attack. The two types of combat appear to have few, if any, important differences for the experienced player at the operational level (deployment of unit or squads in raids) or the strategic level (player-controlled access to important game resources as in EVE Online, Dark Age of Camelot and possibly Warhammer Online). When we look at game mechanics and individual unit tactics, however, important and potentially interesting differences begin to emerge.
Shifting Perspectives: Poledancing and you
Every Tuesday, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting druids and those who group with them. This week, Michael Gray fills in for John Patricelli, to discuss more about mobility for healing Arena Druids.Allison Robert wrote a pretty solid summary of a Druid's life in PvP as a moving target. This week in Shifting Perspectives, I'm focused on a specific aspect of your life as that moving target. I'm talking about one of the most quintessential Resto-Druid skills in small-group Arena play: Poledancing.
ASH pops up on ESRB's site
Tactical title ASH, short for Archaic Sealed Heat, could be headed to the North America. It recently popped up on the ESRB's website, which, as you all know, pretty much means we can expect to hear news confirming our suspicions soon. The question is, though, do any of you still care about it, since it wasn't received with wide, open arms abroad?Any of you interested in ASH? Did you already import it when it was on sale?
So you love Advance Wars: Days of Ruin?
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/nintendo/DS_Fanboy_What_s_left_after_Advance_Wars_Days_of_Ruin'; If you've spent most of this year brain-deep in Advance Wars: Days of Ruin, you just may be itching for something else right about now. Sure, the Advance Wars franchise offers some of the deepest gameplay experiences around, but you can't play it forever (or can you?). If you've gone as far as you can go and are burning for a new game that you can pour hours into, we may just have a solution. We've compiled a list of similar current and forthcoming games for fans in need of a fix. Advance one square and fire away to see what we recommend! Check out our recommendations!
EVE Evolved: The nano problem
Whether certain tactics and ship setups are balanced is a topic that's been constantly debated on the EVE Online forums for as long as I can remember. The argument itself is as old as EVE and is repeated daily on the forums like some kind of popular EVE Online screen play. The script of this play doesn't always follow the same format but the same roles are always filled by the players participating. On one side, we have people who think a certain tactic is unbalanced and should be fixed by CCP in a balance patch. On the other side, we have people who rely on the tactic being discussed that are afraid it might be changed. Everyone else with an opinion falls somewhere on the spectrum between these two extremes.Not so long ago, the arguments were about nosferatu used on a Dominix being unbalanced and remote sensor dampeners being too powerful. Discussions about of these led to some re-balancing to help level the PvP playing field. The latest argument is about nano-fit ships and nano-gangs. The "nano" craze is a PvP ship fitting style and fighting strategy that favours speed over all else. Ships like the Sacrilege and the Ishtar which might normally be fitted with heavy tanks are instead fitted for high speed and agility. Rather than resist and repair damage, a ship with high speed and agility can evade enemy fire altogether. A nano-fit ship can orbit an enemy so quickly that the enemy's turrets can't track them and missiles deal tiny amounts of damage.With some pilots claiming that viable counter-maneuvers exist to combat the nano craze and others calling it "easy mode for PvP", it's hard to know what to think. Read on while I delve into this controversial issue and draw some important conclusions.
WoW a breeding ground for bio-terrorists?
Evidently, there is more to learn from World of Warcraft's infamous "Corrupted Blood" epidemic of 2005 then many had originally surmised. While it was originally thought to merely have limited epidemiological relevance, some are now considering looking at what it might may say about terrorist behavior and the use of biological agents. According to Charles Blair, deputy director for the Center for Terrorism and Intelligence Studies, the deliberate spread of the disease by some players offers a unique perspective that can't really be simulated by computer models, due to the decision-making input of hundreds of independent, free-thinking individuals.For our part, this all seems like a bit of a stretch on the part of the article's author. While in-game terrorist tactics with biological weapons do reflect their real life counter-parts in many ways (e.g. hitting big population centers, focusing on travel hubs to maximize spread, etc.) , we're not sure what sort of insights this sort of comparison could glean for people who are already experts on the topic. Moreover, when the most prominent group of pan-MMO cyber-terrorists are motivated by "lulz," it becomes evident that there's a profound disconnect with reality that has to be accounted for.
Queue dodging: The latest in underhanded arena tactics
The arenas have been a nearly constant source of conflict for many players. It seems that many creative schemes have been used to inflate ratings in the pursuit of gear and glory. The developers implemented personal ratings to combat ill-gotten gains from a single slot buyouts and high-rated team sales. It seems that the latest fad for ratings boost may be queue dodging. Recently, Kenjiwing of Korgath brought this phenomenon to the attention of the official forums. There is currently no penalty for a team that fails to join an arena battle once the queue pops. The team that actually does show receives no reward and the match is recoded as a draw, which does not count toward the requisite games for the week. They are left to wait for another battle in hopes that the other team will show.
Breakfast Topic: AV play style poll
I have a confession to make. I love doing Alterac Valley, but I hate being stuck babysitting flags. I am not a defender- neither at a flag nor at the general's end of the map. As I mentioned on the WoW Insider Show, my main is a Resto Shaman. On Cyclone Battlegroup there seems to be a race to get away from the flag once it's been taken. The last one left is the "defender." Being a healer often times I drink after a taking a flag while everyone else dashes off. I win the right to watch the flag. I stay there and call out incomings. I will not leave a flag undefended, but if there's any way I can scoot out of there, I will. Resto or Holy (depending on class) defending a flag is a terrible waste of healing. I'm more of a speed bump than a defender. I don't kill much as Resto. I do my best, and I can stay up for a while. Hopefully some DPS will show up before I drop. I would much rather be on the front lines, healing the assault forces. I prefer to rush forward and facilitate forward momentum with my heals.
Knights in the Nightmare of a really complicated game
Sting's new RPG Knights in the Nightmare has a lot going on -- so much that we might need some incorporeal wisp to inhabit us and play the game in our stead. Part of the issue, however, is Sting's confusing description of the game. It follows the same flow as most tactical RPGs, but it's described as a five-stage process. Each round of combat begins with some sort of setup -- a scene that relates the battle to the story. Then the "tactics" phase begins and you arrange your soldiers strategically. After that, the battle begins, and you control your knights in a turn-based system. When the battle has ended, another story scene plays. Then a "setup" phase in which you manage and level up your characters. In addition to using items, you can transfer abilities between characters via a "Transoul" system.
The Daily Grind: Are death penalties overkill?
This is one topic that never fails to wind up as a huge discussion any time we get together with gamer friends. Some of us who have been around since the early days of MMOs remember the harsh death penalties that many of these games included. If you died in EverQuest, you would lose experience -- lose too much, and you could lose levels. You also had to run back to your corpse either without any gear on unless you could find a friendly player to rez you. Ahh, the memories. Nowadays, death is disposable in games like World of Warcraft. You get killed by another player in front of Karazhan? No big deal. Just rez and head back. In games like WoW, death is less of an impact than it is an annoyance. It represents a whole 30 seconds you're going to have to spend running back from the conveniently-placed graveyard. Of course, you also resurrect with all your gear on you. And then there are they hybrids like City of Heroes; you don't ever lose enhancements or inspirations, but you do lose some experience when you die. Some people feel like this is a good solid trade-off. It teaches you to be less of a loose-cannon since death does have some impact on your character. On the other hand, it's fairly easy to work off debt in CoX, and you never have to chase down your corpse to either resurrect, or to retrieve your items; you just start in the hospital or your SuperGroup's base. So what do you think? Are the newer no-guilt, no-penalty deaths best, or were the older ones the best? Do you think death penalties teach players to think over strategy before rushing in, or do you think they'd do that anyway? What do you think of the hybrid systems that cause you to lose experience, but not gear? Which game has the best system in your opinion?
DS Fanboy Review: Front Mission
Good things often come in small packages (see also: the DS), and sometimes, they even come in small doses. That's the best way to describe Front Mission, the tactical strategy title that originally debuted on the Super Nintendo, and has now come to the DS. The re-packaged port looks good in its transition to the DS, even without having too much done to it -- not that the series, which hasn't ever achieved major popularity despite being fully awesome -- really needed much more than a spit-shine.But just what is Front Mission? It's an epic tale of giant stompy robots, known here as "wanzers." The story begins in 2090, and two major powers, the O.C.U. and U.C.S., are about to undertake a war of epic proportions. In this version, you can choose either side in battle, though the game recommends that newcomers not only go through the tutorial, but begin with O.C.U. as well.%Gallery-4781%
DS Fanswag: Pick up two units for your DS army!
The DS Fanboy giveaway craze continues with a brand-new shot at a couple of games, all for you. Free. The way games should be. We've got a two-pack for one lucky winner, featuring Heroes of Mana from Square Enix and Luminous Arc from Atlus, valued at $39.99 and $34.99 respectively. If you have a driving need to move some units, all you have to do is leave a comment on this post that answers a very important question between now and Monday, October 22, at 11:59 p.m. Eastern. You may enter once per day only, so please avoid spamming the comments with the same thing over and over. On Tuesday the 23rd, we'll select one lucky winner in a random drawing and ship off your free games. Does it get any better than that? We think not. There are, of course, a few caveats. Winners must be both U.S. citizens and over the age of 18 (sorry, guys!). You can check out the full official rules here.So, here's the question: witches or rabites? Feel free to explain at length.
Final Fantasy Tactics A2 to feature bastards
Six weeks away from the SRPG's release in Japan, Square Enix has offered a preview of job classes for the two new tribes in Final Fantasy Tactics A2: The Sealed Grimoire, the Seeq and Gria, the former being a race resembling portly pigs and originally appearing in Final Fantasy XII, and the latter of which are a humanoid feminine race with dragon-like characteristics.The Seeq's Raptor class has skills similar to the Knights' in Final Fantasy Tactics, while the Gria's Lunistas are able to trade HP to increase their critical hit chance. Both tribes also have a Bastard class which we assume to comprise of one of the following:
