Lions and wizards and knockbacks, oh my

Is it just me, or are some of the abilities on the Order side of WAR a bit…ridiculous.  Let’s take the White Lion ability “Fetch,” for example.  The WL can send his pet lion in to fetch you back to him, basically punting you back into the middle of a giant pile of Order.  The spell has a 150 foot range, which is freaking huge, and is basically a death sentence.  If you get fetched, you’re a goner.  An “I Win” button.

Another example are the knockbacks that Order has.  Every.  Single.  Class.  I’ve been knocked back by bright wizards, shadow warriors, warrior priests, iron breakers, white lions, arch mages….you name it.  I’ve been punted into the lava so many times at Tor Anroc in T3 that I stopped even queueing up for that scenario.  Why does every class need a knockback?  I can see it for tanks.  I can even see it for healers, though the Disciple of Khaine doesn’t get one until level 40, which hardly seems fair.  But a freaking wizard?  Isn’t the wizard supposed to melt my face off?  C’mon, I’m a witch elf!  I’m wearing paper armor, too, and you don’t see me getting a knockback to get the bad guys off me.

Now, granted, sometimes the lucky order player I”m stabbing knocks me back into my own group, which is fantastic.  They save my life for me.  But more often than not, players are skilled enough to position to knock me back into their own teeming horde, and I’m toast. 

Knockback is one of those abilities that just make me bang my head on the desk.  Either because it leads to my death, or because the Destro tank that I decide to assist by coming to stabbity stabbity his target to death decides to hit his knockback button, effectively sending the target out of my range to kill–and possibly saving the bad guy’s life.  Memo to tank:  when the melee dps shows up to help you, PLEASE don’t knock the target away from the melee dps.  Thanks.

These are just a few of my little pet peeves while fighting Order.

Dungeon Crawls, oh how I’ve missed you….

Last night, some guildmates and I got a full 6-man party together and headed to one of the noted T4 zones, Bastion Stair.  It is set up as a large dungeon containing several different wings, various public quests and boss fights.  Apparently, some very good gear drops there as well, though for some reason we weren’t in luck last night.  Nothing but Chaos gear for our band of merry dark elves.

The long and short of it was that I had a great time.  It was nice to be in a more “traditional” setting again, where I’ve been doing primarily ORvR, scenarios, public quests and a bit of PvE questing.  Our group was fairly well set up, with 2 black guards, a witch elf and 3 disciples of khaine.  We could have used a bit more DPS, but at least we had adequate heals and some heavy plate to take the damage.  My witch elf was the highest level of the group, so I did rip aggro a few times.  My detaunt can only do so much!

The dungeon crawl is something that WAR has been lacking for me, and I’d like to see more of these types of zones appear in game at a later time.  Also, it would be nice to see some instancing, rather than making them large public dungeons.  With the PQ’s you have to share the influence and hope you contribute enough to boost your chances for a good loot sack upon completion.  I’d love just to see more traditional dungeons, containing some tough fights and bosses.  With the exception of Gunbad, there aren’t many alternatives for lower-level folks to experience this type of content.  Most of the dungeons seem to be found in T4.

All the same, this has come at a good time for me, as I’m finding RvR in T4 a bit frustrating, due to not being at max level yet and lacking suitable gear.  These dungeons should help me solve my gear problem, and at the same time, provide a nice opportunity to explore a zone with my guildmates, sneak in a bit of RP, and generally flex my PvE muscles in an old-yet-new way.

The Order Zerg

So I logged into my level 35 Witch Elf today in Warhammer Online, hoping to do a little RvR and gain some influence for some elite rewards that I’d love to have. There was some action in Caledor, a T4 zone, so I joined up with an alliance warband and headed off to fight.

We got slaughtered.

It wasn’t even sporting, honestly. I think Destro had about one and a half warbands to two, so around 36 to 48 players battling it out for objectives and the two keeps in the lake. I died so much, I was afraid the grey box with “respawn” on it was going to permanently burn into my monitor screen. I think Order must have had at least four full warbands there. They chased us down and pretty much butchered us each and every time we attempted to defend a keep, take an objective, run, take a drink, breathe–you get the picture.

Now here’s the thing: I don’t mind dying in RvR most of the time, especially if it’s a good fight where both sides are slugging it out and have an even chance to win. I don’t mind fighting even when there is a SLIGHT disadvantage for my side. But one-sided, zerg-tastic, free-for-all slaughter? No thanks. That’s not fun, it’s frustrating. I didn’t earn anything today, but I think I probably spent at least a couple of gold on healing myself of death penalties.

Frustration was high, and the Destro warbands were getting irritable and discouraged. A lot of people ended up leaving to go do something else. After an hour or so, I was one of them.

All of this to make the point that our beloved server, Phoenix Throne, is rapidly becoming unbalanced. Order has flocked here “because of the balance” and the “good population,” and what they’ve brought with them is a herd of non-rp’ers, power gamers and twelve year olds with a Legolas complex. Yeah, yeah–I’m sure some are going to say I’m just upset because Destro is losing. I answer that by saying that I don’t mind losing a good fight. But to just log in and get slaughtered with no chance at all? No thanks.

The real loser here is Phoenix Throne. It reminds me of a terrific little unknown town that gets “discovered” by tourists and immediately loses the charm that made it terrific in the first place. I’m discouraged. I hope it gets better.