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Welcome to the 937th Edition of Loading...

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The Pulse

First, you vote with what you view at Ten Ton Hammer, and the result is the Ten Ton Pulse.

World of Warcraft- 200 BPM Warhammer Online - 150 BPM Age of Conan - 39 BPM Stargate Worlds - 18 BPM Tabula Rasa - 17 BPM Lord of the Rings Online - 17 BPM EVE Online - 10 BPM EverQuest 2 - 10 BPM Vanguard: Saga of Heroes - 8 BPM Atlantica Online - 7 BPM

If the Top 10 isn't enough, we also show the Top 20 and Top 50 lists as well, available to everyone on our homepage. (What is Pulse?)

Daily Column

Loading... the bacon salt in your MMOG news and commentary diet.

I received some interesting email responses to the question I posed on Friday about what fantasy IPs you folks would like to see developed into MMOGs. Answers ranged from Michael Moorcock's Elric Saga to Atlantis and even Robert Shea's Illuminatus trilogy. Atlantis was particularly interesting to me, as I'd like to see a serious treatment of Greek and Norse mythology - something on the order of what Gods & Heroes could have been. Thanks for your responses!

==

I hope you had as relaxing a weekend as I did. After a summer and early fall of almost non-stop travel, this was the first weekend that I spent almost purely in-game in too long a time. I had (and still have) some serious catching up to do since my guild switched to destruction on yet another different server. I rolled Black Orc, both because I like the connectedness of a tank (with meatshields and pure healers, you need other players to make fast progress, and other players are more than half the reason to play an MMOG) and the greenskins are easily the most lighthearted of the destro races. Your first quest has you fighting scrappy dwarves in their tighty whities, for example, and greenskin quest dialogue is always worth a read and often a laugh too.

If you've played Warhammer Online for any length of time, you know that playing WAR like WoW isn't the best or most enjoyable way to level. Stay in the scenario queue for experience, find a group and grind public quests for items and decent experience in the meantime, and failing that, do some quests.

That scenarios are the fastest way to level is well-known to Mythic and was (to some degree) intentional on their part. In a Ten Ton Hammer exclusive interview with Mark Jacobs (which also included some choice bits on the two classes to be re-added to the game and crafting in general), Mark had this to say:

"Right now, the fastest way to level is through scenarios. I don't want to nerf scenarios; I'd much rather improve Open RvR. Now some people will think we're nerfing scenarios simply because we're adding more to Open RvR, but that's just how it's going to be. "

In my experience, Open RvR and the back-and-forth fight for battlefield objectives are the best experience of the game, and its very good news that Mythic is looking to offer more incentives to join the fight for zone control. But having played tier 1 and a little of tier 2 on the side of both Order and Destruction, I'm concerned that the problem has more to do with zone design, which isn't easily fixed.

For example, in the Empire / Chaos areas, spawnpoints, NPC healers (to heal death penalties), and camps (to cash in on RvR gains) in Nordland are right on the edge of the Open RvR area. But in the Dwarf / Greenskins campaign, camps seem to be placed either far away from the front lines in terms of the physical distance or the maze-like walking distance to each BO in Ekrund. I found it was far easier to organize and mobilize to take back BOs in Nordland than in Mount Bloodhorn.

Maybe this improves as the game goes on, and you could say that my orc could just fly off to Nordland and fight there (which is true), but I have a hunch that new dwarf and greenskin players without the inkling or desire to travel, in particular, aren't getting exposed to a very compelling and fun side of the game.

What are your thoughts on RvR in Warhammer Online or Open PvP in general? Post your thoughts in the Loading... forum, or email me directly if you like.

Ten Ton Hammer Epic Thread of the Day

Sometimes they're funny; sometimes they're foolish; sometimes they're flaming;
sometimes they're cool. Whatever this one happens to be, it's
our Epic Thread of the Day.

====================
From our Atlantica Online Forum

Reasons why I love Atlantica Online

If you haven't checked out the free-to-play, turn-based MMOG, Atlantica Online,
it may be time you did. Danny "Ralsu" Gourley, Ten Ton Hammer's
resident pony harvester (it's in his job description--seriously!),
has long recommended Atlantica in his weekly Top Ten Free-to-Play Games
review. Now community member dt1984 has posted an image under the title
"Reasons why I love Atlantica Online" in our forum. Have you tried the
game? Do you love it, loathe it, or feel something in between? Make
your opinion known in the thread. Or give the game a try and then talk about it in our Atlantica Online community forum.

Awesome Quote from the Epic Thread:

"It isn't perfect, but I am having fun, which is the most important thing about it in my opinion."
- STAT
====================

Do you have a favorite Epic Thread? Let us know!

17 new MMOG hand-crafted articles today! 205 in October! 2705 in 2008!

New MMOG Articles At Ten Ton Hammer Today [Thanks Phil Comeau for links and Real World News]

BlizzCon 2008

Images/Video

Age of Conan: 12 New Ymir's Pass Screenshots Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria Runekeeper Video Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria 'Foundations of Stone' Video City of Heroes: Issue 13 New Powers Video Sword of the New World: Update Screenshots

Interviews

Warhammer Online: State of the Game with Mark Jacobs D&D Insider: Pre-Launch with Randy Buehler

Features

Warhammer Online: Tales of Third Party Sales

Community

WAR Torn #9: "Of Baby Eating" Vanguard: Dalmarus' Chronicles - Buy Yourselves Some Time

Guides

Warhammer Online: Witch Hunter Abilities - Lvl 1-20 Warhammer Online: Witch Hunter Abilities - Lvl 21-40 Warhammer Online: Warrior Priest Abilities - Lvl 1-20 Warhammer Online: Warrior Priest Abilities - Lvl 21-40 Warhammer Online: Bright Wizard Abilities - Lvl 1-20 Warhammer Online: Bright Wizard Abilities - Lvl 21-40 Warhammer Online: Archmage Masteries

Hot Content - Or, what I took a fancy to:

BlizzCon 2008 Warhammer Online: State of the Game with Mark Jacobs D&D Insider: Pre-Launch with Randy Buehler Warhammer Online: Tales of Third Party Sales WAR Torn #9: "Of Baby Eating" World of Warcraft PvP Panel World of Warcraft UI Panel from a Player's Perspective World of Warcraft: How Players Trade Time for Rewards A Player's Opinion of the WoW Raid Panel

Real World News

Police arrest man for car wash vacuum sex

He now regrets the experiment, says it really sucked Rain makes you fatter

Long-term effects on Korean pop stars still undetermined Man shoots himself in foot while chasing cat

First the cat, then on to the wascally wabbit

Thanks again for visiting the Ten Ton Hammer network!

- Jeff "Ethec" Woleslagle and the Ten Ton Hammer Team