My Rating: 9.7 / 10

I haven't had a chance to play this game, but thanks to a relative of mine I was able to see a first hand look at the game. He works on character and building detail, so he showed me some of the dwarves, monsters, stautes, and a building, he helped with or made. I saw the landscape and some of the environment interaction...and this is going to be an awesome game!!!

My Rating: 9.3 / 10

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning is the latest MMORPG from EA Mythic, the creators of Dark Age Of Camelot and Ultima Online. Originally, World of Warcraft was being built by Blizzard for Games Workshop to be World of Warhammer. Games Workshop didn't like the direction Blizzard was heading with the game and too far into production, Games Workshop cutoff their ties with Blizzard. Blizzard then converted their game to match the Warcraft lore and storyline. Games Workshop has now teamed up with EA Mythic to provide you an MMO they believe is true to the Warhammer Experience.

First things first, the character creator. It's a fairly MMO-generic character creator. First, your race.



Then, you go onto picking one of three classes based off your character.

Career chart

WAR Career Chart

Armies	Tank	Melee DPS	Ranged DPS	Healer
Dwarfs	Ironbreaker	None (formerly Hammerer)[7]	Engineer	Runepriest
The Empire	Knight of the Blazing Sun	Witch Hunter	Bright Wizard	Warrior Priest
High Elves	Swordmaster	White Lion	Shadow Warrior	Archmage
Greenskins	Black Orc	None (formerly Choppa)[7]	Goblin Squig Herder	Goblin Shaman
Chaos	Chosen (Male Only)	Marauder (Male Only)	Magus	Zealot
Dark Elves	Black Guard	Witch Elf (Female Only)	Sorceress/Sorcerer	Disciple of Khaine

Choppa and Hammerer have been removed from the game before release due to EA Mythic wanting to release only the characters that are most realized. Knight of the Blazing Sun and the Black Guard were recently added in a December Live Event.

I only have made empire characters so here's what happened for me. I made my character and found myself in the starting town. It's fairly quiet except for all the various NPCs that stand around. As soon as you enter WAR, you can feel the atmosphere. It's a tough time with the huge war between Destruction and Chaos raging, and everyone knows that if they lose, they'll most likely all be killed or taken prisoner. I had a little trouble figuring out how to get to the Open Party window, but once I did it was a breeze. I first followed a road, and found an open party within my area (It tells you how many minutes away walking distance they are) and I quickly walked to them. They were battling some enemies (NPCs) so I joined their open party and helped. As you do parts of the quest, it gets harder. After beating the boss of Stage 3, I thought we were done. I was excited to get my first gear of the game, and then I saw it. By it, I mean a GIANT troll. Like, 20 feet high, maybe higher. He comes snarling through the woods, and he even sends a tree flying onto the road we were standing on (These are big trees btw). After a long heavy fight, and one of us dying, we roll for loot.

The loot system in Warhammer Online is pretty good. After finishing a Public Quest, a chest appears and a window opens. Everyone rolls a random number between 001 and 999. You then get your contribution bonus added. The top 5 contributors get a bonus +500 +400 +300 +200 and +100 although that may be less if you have hardly any members in your group. Also, if you are doing the quest again after doing it earlier, you get a bonus if you didn't win anything last time, increasing your chances of winning. These chances stack and stack until you win.

Depending on the scenario, Public Quest, and group, you may get certain bags. Green bags contain good or average loot, blue bags hold good or great loot, and gold is the best. You rarely see gold, as it usually only pops up in a difficult public quest with a large group.

Next, I tried out the PVP in War. Clicking on a button on your minimap, you can scroll through 3 described scenarios. You can sign up for them all, sign up for them all as a party, or just sign up for the ones you want (as a party too). Once signed up, the symbol will show that you are currently Queued for a Scenarios. Scenarios are like mini-battles between Destruction and Order. Once nobody is in the map for that scenario, People will start getting warped to the scenario. The scenario can hold around 20 people per side, but in my experience the battles range from 8-15 players. The battles are fast paced and the scenario has objectives. Sometimes it's as simple as capturing flag points, and other times it's as complicated as holding onto a flag that kills you and slows you down but gives you more points for killing other players.

Next, are Keeps. Keeps are castles located all over the world in areas of regions. These keeps are constantly monitored by your map. Your entire region (which is quite large... think like a Province or State) gets an alert that it's getting attacked, or your region is attacking an Enemy keep. Enemies in your region (Empire and Chaos share the same regions, etc.) either attack your keep or defend yours, and what happens is there is a bar at the top right. There is two arrows equally spaced from the enemy's Heraldry. If their bar (which increases by them killing your players and taking your keeps and objectives) reaches the arrow, they gain control of the region and gain bonuses such as Cheaper Merchant Prices, Special Renown Merchants, Better Sell Prices, and increased Renown.

Renown is like a form of XP that you get for killing players. You need certain levels for equipment, and with those level ups in Renown, you can get some new stats like upgraded attacking power.

Overall, Warhammer Online is a fairly amazing game. The graphics are quite a step up from World of Warcraft (to my knowledge) and I love it's gritty realism. Destruction is not merely understood like Horde, they are actually evil and want to destroy the world. It gives it a more mythical Lord of the Rings feel, rather than feeling like some weak artificial fight. WAR is a wonderful, gritty game that I will pay $15 a month for because although I hated WoW, this is a game I just can't put down and every guild I've been in has been amazing so far.