While the 2008 New York Comic Con has come and gone, out of left field comes a preview of Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning from the event. Written by Saladin Yussuf who attended the Con, his perspective comes from the Strumgrenadier forums. Looking at everything from mechanics to graphics, he covers various of aspects of the game providing insight into where the game stands. Thanks to Strumgrenadier for letting us repost this.

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Recently, a WAR fan who attended NYC Comicon wrote up an decent review on his experience. It's a different perspective than what we normally see, but it's a breath of fresh air to hear how well things are going - read it below:

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Charge!

Well! What a day and experience! Ill be brief with my intro so I can get to the good stuff! Remember this is an event build and things are subject to change.

I got to the Javits Center at about 730 ( the doors to the exhibition hall opened at 10). There were about 2-300 people in front of me, and thousands behind where I waited. When we got let free I made a quick beeline straight to booth 1649, EA Mythic! Low and behold, I was the FIRST and only person there for about 20 minutes. I got a damn good overview of things from EA Mythic's Community Manager. He and I had many a conversation throughout the nearly 6 hours I was at their booth. Also met a guy from Ten Ton Hammer who apparently knows us very well, so I invited him to come check us out.

They had 24 computers set up, each with a different class. This event however they only had the following available: chosen, Marauder, Zealot, Warrior Priest, Bright Wizard, Sword Master, Arch Mage, Shadow Warrior, Disciple, and Sorceress. I went straight to the Marauder. But that’s to follow.

World Graphics and Sound

First off the game is absolutely stunning. Screenshots and videos do not do it justice, at all. Crisp, vibrant, gritty, dark. war. The world that I saw was seemless, well made, lots of nice do-dads to add nice chaos flavor, like mutated tentacle trees and dead bodies, stretched skins etc. the models are of very high quality with GREAT textures. My marauder was a semi-hair covered man beast with chaosy spiky bits and a very unpleasant look on his face. The sky was ominous with a portal to the warp..and the entry chaos wheel is holy god nice. The colors are much darker and less cartoony than wow, and far FAR better than AoC ( and wow). Also, the water looked like the water does in HL2 water way level, and reflected the sky and surrounding land in great detail…yet with a murky oily sickly look. Also, dynamic character shadows on the ground, which fit perfectly ones avatar as it moves about, even rocks and trees.

The world sound was a dark ambient mix of lightning, explosions, wailing, and wind. It really set the mood and helped to draw me into the game, with music fading in and out in a pleasant manner to add great affect. Chaos npc speech is creepy as hell. They are quite evil. I love it.

UI/HUD/MAP

The ui is very straight forward and intuitive, and easy to follow with a simple yet pleasing design, and quite functional. On screen is your avatar picture, health, action point bar, XP, and renown bars. There is a minimap, various menu items ( tactics TOK etc) up top in small icons. The center middle is your action and moral bars. Similar to wows, but I liked this one a little better. Seemed cleaner somehow.

The character screen is very similar to wow, so its familiar and easy to use. Ones avatar is much larger though so you can see in greater detail what you look like in that window. Also, 4 ring slots.

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Safety Inside

The backpack has a lot of slots, I didn’t count but its around 40-60 I think. Also, there is a separate tab for a ‘separate’ backpack that only holds quest items. Very handy. Money is copper silver brass.

Tactic window and abilities/masteries is easy to use and user friendly, with the same design criteria as other windows: simple yet pleasing.

The map screen is great. You get 3 veiws: zone, RvR control of your racial war( very cool) and world. The RvR map is great because it shows you where contested zones are and what % controlled and by what faction. Very handy for speedy deployments. There are coordinates, quest tracker that links to your Tome of Knowledge, and you can toggle off your quest tracker area outlines( shows you a vague area where your quest takes place). It’s a good map. I majored in geography and I love this games maps.

Abilities and action points (AP)

At present all classes have 250 AP, which is not affected by gear, though there are tactics that reduce the ap of certain abilities. Most abilities are 10-140ish ap, with a respawn rate about as fast as a rogues energy in wow, if you are out of combat. At first I was worried but, you can run out if you span abilities and you will be left high and dry, so management is key. One cool ability it looks like all characters have in the build I played is called ‘flee’ burns all AP and increase run speed by 30% for 10 seconds. One can also use it to charge into whatever they wish, but must realize they will be out of ap for at least 10 seconds after you slow down, so it must be used with caution...as it got me dead in RvR twice.

Tactics and Masteries

Passive abilities that greatly diversify a group. Their system isn’t final yet, but watch the tactics podcast for a better description. But ill say this: based on what I saw their will be GREAT chance for diverse classes depending on how people use tactics. So every marauder wont have the same nuanced play styles as every one else in that class.

Masteries are varied and diverse, appeared to be all viable with yet more character customization ( in terms of play style). I couldn’t remember the names, but there are a lot and there wont be a flavor of the month, as bob put it. There are also nice RvR based tactics that cost RvR ‘currency’ you get for killing and winning and general RVR. You get 100 points total over 40 levels, so spend wisely. Refunds are being discussed but I couldn’t find out anything else than that

Quests

Didn’t have time to experience much in this way, but they appear within a red outline on your maps so you know where abouts you have to go, but its not at all exact. Its useful though. Less time wondering and wandering and more time killing.

Animations and effects

Well done. The animations I think could use a little more work, but overall they're similar to wow. The affect graphics and particle hells yeah looks….mind blowing. Large scale battles are going to be total war and mayhem. Movement is pretty good, though.

RvR

The crown jewel of WAR. Im not going to get into the specifics of the class I played, just the general feelings and what I think about it.

It F###ing rocks. If you want to win you MUST employ sound tactics, coordination, and sound team work. Its intense, hardcore and fluid. It sucks you in and leaves you wanting more and more. Collision really plays a huge roll and tanks are viable. The famed ‘ go for the healer’ is harder than you think, and you really have to pay attention else you will wind up gutted or burned. Probably both. SG will shine brightly in RvR. Our members will enjoy it. Its like WSG on steroids…then it vomits gold and says “ ill buy you ice cream” I love it. Form factor chaos. I think we may actually be able to employ infantry formations that function quite well. Flanking maneuvers work wonders. Too. Again it boils down to situational awareness. This is pvp like never before! Hostile and friendly indicator reticles at the base of your avatar helps point you in the right direction, keeping your eyes focused front and center, rather than having to dart to your minimap.

Crafting and Items

Item drops in the starter zone is similar to wow starter zones: mostly ‘grey’ items and parts with creative names like ‘doom chain’ and’ flesh eating bugs’. I did however get 2 ‘green’ quality drops that weren't for my class, so I just sold them. The beastmen and zombies I killed dropped 1-4 items and a bit of copper. Not to much from the ordinary. I did however come across two items used for crafting: some kinda plant item used in a healing potion. This would suggest some kinda alchemy tree? And the other, which I found highly more interesting were seeds used to grow a plant. Its crafting classification? Cultivation. Could growing things be a part of war? time will tell.

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Thanks again to Sturmgrenadier and their leader Lostlogic for allowing us to repost. Sturmgrenadier has been established since 2000 and boasts over 650 members, so if you are interested in learning more about them, check out their site.