In this weeks WildStar Guild Spotlight, I managed to snatch a few minutes of 2ARC Gamings time and more specifically, their WildStar division known as Subterfuge.


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Ten Ton Hammer: For anyone who might never heard of 2ARC Gaming or Subterfuge, please can you tell us a little more about yourself?

Subterfuge: 2ARC Gaming is a community devoted to creating a home for competitive gamers in all genres. We provide the tools for gamers to discuss, theorycraft, and compete in the games of their choice all in a supportive and friendly environment.

Subterfuge is 2ARC Gaming’s Wildstar guild and is a group of dedicated and hardcore raiders that are paving their way into WildStar. We are a collective with a wide variety of high end raid experience. Primarily our experience has been with World of Warcraft, but most of our members have experiences in a variety of games. We plan to focus all of our efforts on Wildstar, as it seems to be everything we are hoping for in a new competitive, hardcore MMO.

Ten Ton Hammer: Why do you think Subterfuge has been so successful for so long?

Subterfuge: We were formed in July of 2010 by a small group of friends and was focused on having a great time and playing at a high level while remaining as low key as possible. While many changes have taken place, the original founders are still involved and we are try to maintain the same sense of humor and importance of friendship that they originally brought to the guild.

Subterfuge as a whole has and will continue to be successful based on the strong, tight-knit sense of camaraderie that is constantly being exercised in the raid group. We pride ourselves in knowing how all of our members perform, and to what extent they can bring their knowledge and experience in order to influence the group in a positive way.

Ten Ton Hammer:  What has drawn Subterfuge to WildStar?

Subterfuge: Although we as a community are expanding outside of Wildstar and MMOs, Subterfuge has been all about Wildstar for quite some time now. Subterfuge is a guild formed up of a good chunk of players who have had extensive experience in Vanilla WoW, so the idea of bringing back 40 mans and the grandeur that comes with it really stirred up some nostalgia. We are getting a lot of the same feelings from WildStar that we did in old school WoW. It felt like an unknown, ever-expanding path with a ton of knowledge ready to be eaten up. We have a lot of theorycrafters and number crunchers, so countless hours are being spent soaking in all the information on rotations, builds, rune-sets and the like.

Many of us had all but given up on MMOs with the utter failures we’ve encountered post-WoW. Wildstar has re-ignited our love of large scale raiding and renewed our hope for an MMO that delivers a huge end game. We are all super enamoured with the game, and are very excited to see what it will bring at launch and beyond.

Ten Ton Hammer: You’ve had a lot of success in World of Warcrafts raid environment - do you intend on playing both games?

Subterfuge: The majority of our Wildstar raid team had already become disillusioned and left WoW previously. Subterfuge has managed to amass a great group of people who all have very extensive experience in MMOs, with a large chunk having server/NA first experience in WoW. Subterfuge will, however, be focusing solely on Wildstar. 2ARC Gaming has an active WoW division, but the raiding schedule are such that our members can only be on one progression team at a time.

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Ten Ton Hammer: If you’ve played through some of WildStar’s raids already, how did you find them and how successful were you? How did you feel the difficulty compared to World of Warcrafts?

Subterfuge: We are completely addicted to the raids in Wildstar, and have found that Carbine has unearthed a whole different level of difficulty and mechanics that is unmatched by other MMOs. We are currently on the second floor of Genetic Archives (the 20 man raid), but will be waiting to see what kind of changes this UI 2.0 patch brings in regards to difficulty!

It seems that every patch to date has managed to alter the raid in some way that makes us beat our heads against a wall for a little bit longer than normal. That is one of the main things we love about Wildstar. You aren't spoon fed in this game. It is your job to earn it, and you are rewarded when you do. We are thrilled to see the days returning where you will see that one character in the capital city rocking a raid set that makes you drool.

It is hard to compare the raids in Wildstar to WoW, because the mechanics are completely different. It really is a completely different beast in Wildstar. You have to optimize all your DPS, buffs, and debuffs, while having a simultaneously huge emphasis on positioning. This game requires a level of awareness that is just not seen in WoW, at least from our experience.

Ten Ton Hammer: Does Subterfuge have any interest in Warplots and if not, why not?

Subterfuge: We will be putting our focus primarily on PvE, but will definitely be throwing groups together for Warplots on off days or down time caused by gating or raid lockouts. Most of the guild is equally pumped for PvP and will be climbing the ranks on Warplot, Arena, and BG ladders. We think Warplots are a great idea, but a bit more optimization needs to go into the game for them to shine. Throwing that many people into one place at one time can seem like you are playing through a well-decorated powerpoint presentation. There is a huge potential, however, for Warplots to be a great success.

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Ten Ton Hammer: If you could point out the best and worst that WildStar has to offer, what would it be?

Subterfuge: The sheer amount of content Carbine has in this game will blow people away. We don't think that there has been an MMO to date that has a physics system this smooth, along with hours and hours worth of content for people to chew through. If they bring out content in monthly patches as they have planned, it will be mind blowing. They are going to (and will have to) work very hard to earn and keep our subscriptions and the majority of Subterfuge is already committed for the long term.

The worst Wildstar has to offer is probably the questing system. In Subterfuge we were looking forward to no-lifing it to max level in full parties, but as things stand it is less beneficial to quest in a group, as many of the objectives take longer, MUCH longer to complete with more than 2 people. You are punished in full parties as kill quests go from 8 or 12 mobs to complete, up to quotas of around 100 mobs.

Carbine has made some great cinematics and does a great job at including you in the story. It will really appeal to people taking their time to enjoy the leveling process. But as a guild pushing progression, we just want to rush to max level and leave the lore and flower picking to others.

Ten Ton Hammer: How would you rate WildStar’s chances of success in today’s modern MMOG market? Competition is pretty tough with the likes of Elder Scrolls Online and World of Warcrafts expansion…

Subterfuge: We feel Wildstar has a great chance of success in today's market. ESO is after a different crowd, considering they do not have a robust end-game like Wildstar does. ESO will attract the people who love Skyrim lore, while Wildstar will attract the hardcore, min-maxing folk that want to push progression and feel the progression instantaneously. There is nothing like going into a boss fight, learning it, and at the end of the day, after beating your heads into a wall, attempt after attempt, seeing the boss hitting the ground and the reaction that comes over voice comms. Its a real sense of accomplishment that comes with this type of MMO raiding, and I think Wildstar has done it right.

Warlords of Draenor has potential to pull some subs away from Wildstar for a short period of time, but it's unlikely to last. Wildstar may start out a bit smaller, but as long as they continue pushing out difficult, gripping content like they have, it is very likely that we will see Wildstar explode into the next popular MMO we have been waiting for.

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Ten Ton Hammer: Where end game content is concerned, how do you feel about WildStars? Do you think Carbine have offered players enough out of the gates to keep guilds such as yours  entertained long term?

Subterfuge: We wouldn’t be putting in the amount of effort and testing that we are if we didn’t believe in the long term potential and draw for people to stick around in WildStar. To old school WoW raiders - those who loved how it used to be - the return of attunements is enough to get us excited. They are the one thing that gave you that real sense of accomplishment knowing that you put in your time and you can finally zone into that instance your buddies have been running. We are thrilled that they are included in Wildstar. Some may cringe at the memory WoW attunements, but we are thrilled that it’s not a free for all stampede into the 20 and 40 man raids.

To even begin raiding, people will need to acquire Elder Gems to purchase an item to start an attunement quest. This item costs 150 Elder Gems, which are earned through killing mobs, completing dungeons, and doing quests all once at max level. You cannot get more than 140 Elder Gems in a week. So right there, the hardcore guilds are forced to wait at least a week after launch (unless they hit 50 within the first couple days of head start on May 31st.. hint hint). Then you are required to beat ALL the veteran dungeons and adventures before you can even set foot in the 20 man. Then good luck beating any of the bosses right away because your raid will likely have some pretty sub-par gear.

But wait, there's more!

Your guild cannot touch the 40 man until you have killed the last boss in the Genetic Archives. Talk about some serious longevity. Carbine is really making guilds earn access to Elder Game content. Pugs are going to have it rough.  And people on your server will know what you’ve accomplished when they see the badassery that is your end-game raiding gear when you're walking around Illium.

Ten Ton Hammer: Are you currently recruiting and if so, what sets you apart from other guilds that are?

Subterfuge: We're currently recruiting for our 40 man hardcore roster. We have set a pretty high standard for those we bring in and we are proud to have a stellar group of raiders who are all hiveminded towards the same goals and achievements. We are eating, sleeping, and breathing this game right now - we are not waiting for open beta or launch. You can bet that if there is something to find out about a class, spec, build, or fight, we are going to do our damndest to find it and master it prior to head start weekend.

There are many great guilds building a team for Wildstar as well, and if anything sets us apart it is probably our quirky personality and sense of humor. We try to find a balance between the hard progression push and not taking ourselves so seriously that we can’t have fun. 

Subterfuge are a US Dominion Guild focused on hardcore raiding and PvP whom are currently recruiting. We'd like to thank them for taking the time out to answer our questions.

Do you want your guild in the spotlight? Drop me an email at lewisb[at]tentonhammer.com or via Twitter @Persistentworld


To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our WildStar Game Page.

Last Updated: Mar 29, 2016

About The Author

Lewis is a long standing journalist, who freelances to a variety of outlets.

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