First step into warhammer online

[delnelrimnim]

Greetings,
I play MMOs for about 13 years now, but I never had contact with warhammer online. A friend of mine told me how much fun he had with the game back then, and I came across this server last Sunday.

So, bringing two others, we will have a look at the fantastic world of warhammer and see how deep we can delve into this game.

[Luuca]

I welcome you and yours to the world. I bid ye remember this is an Alpha server, a labor of love, and it will have issues. It's not as polished as a retail release, but it has its charms and a lot of fun can be had.

A few things to bear in mind:

1. it's a group game. You need a group to be effective for the most part. Tier 1 is a lot of fun.

2. make friends, and enemies. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending upon the thickness of your skin) cross realm chat has been disabled. You won't be able to talk with your enemies any more. But if you talk with your realm mates, friends are easy to come by.

3. learn your class, and use the forums to learn more.

Have fun, and welcome.

[CountTalabecland]

Welcome

A few things you may not realize if you didn't play on live but there are 40 levels for each character, these are now divided into:
T1: lvls 1-16
Mid-Tier: 16-31
T4: 31-40

Note: In Orvr (open world PvP), midtier and T4 are merged so all Orvr players fight in all zones that are not T1 (confusing I know w/o the context of how things worked on live). type ".rvr" in the ingame chat to see where you should be going to fight.

Now comes the more difficult part. There used to be 4 tiers to this game but they have been merged into 3 sort of 2. T1 works like it sounds and then after that at level 16 you will be in the "mid-tier." If your character enters into rvr or scenarios your "stats" will be bolstered to lvl "48," (scenarios work a little differently but the bolster concept is the same) in order for you to compete with lvl 40s. However, once you pass rank 30 your bolster will not bolster your stats as high and you need to start acquiring endgame/T4 gear. Many player abandon rvr at lvl 31 in order to lvl to 40 so as to be more competitive against other lvl 40s rather than attempt to keep PvPing with subpar stats and taking a beating most of the time.
My advice, get as high of renown rank (purple) in T1 as possible. This will make gearing with your exp level (yellow) much faster. AND OF COURSE, join a guild (maybe one of the dwarf ones ).
If you have any questions you can ask them in-game in the advice channel. type "/ad" and press space.

[delnelrimnim]

Thank you for your greetings. To comment on the specific points and advises:

I welcome you and yours to the world. I bid ye remember this is an Alpha server, a labor of love, and it will have issues. It's not as polished as a retail release, but it has its charms and a lot of fun can be had.

I am well aware of that. I already have experiences on private servers hosting other MMOs, don't worry.

1. it's a group game. You need a group to be effective for the most part. Tier 1 is a lot of fun.

We already noticed that last evening. Some vaults and dungeons have monsters respawning so very fast it seems very tough to go there alone. But as we have a tank, a healer and a ranged damage dealer, we did not run into any problems. It's a nice change of pace though. Today's MMOs do not seem to emphasize on group play any more apart from random dungeons.

2. make friends, and enemies. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending upon the thickness of your skin) cross realm chat has been disabled. You won't be able to talk with your enemies any more. But if you talk with your realm mates, friends are easy to come by.

I will reroll another character tonight, so I have a toon to play with, when my friends are not online. I very much like the socializing aspect of a multiplayer game, and I look forward to meet other players, ether for teaming up within the own faction or for 'cultural exchange' with the opposing one.

3. learn your class, and use the forums to learn more.

I think I will have many questions in the next few days, and will ask them here on the forums. After all most players around here, have played in retail, so I think I am in the minority here.

A few things you may not realize if you didn't play on live but there are 40 levels for each character, these are now divided into:
T1: lvls 1-16
Mid-Tier: 16-31
T4: 31-40

Note: In Orvr (open world PvP), midtier and T4 are merged so all Orvr players fight in all zones that are not T1 (confusing I know w/o the context of how things worked on live). type ".rvr" in the ingame chat to see where you should be going to fight.

Now comes the more difficult part. There used to be 4 tiers to this game but they have been merged into 3 sort of 2. T1 works like it sounds and then after that at level 16 you will be in the "mid-tier." If your character enters into rvr or scenarios your "stats" will be bolstered to lvl "48," (scenarios work a little differently but the bolster concept is the same) in order for you to compete with lvl 40s. However, once you pass rank 30 your bolster will not bolster your stats as high and you need to start acquiring endgame/T4 gear. Many player abandon rvr at lvl 31 in order to lvl to 40 so as to be more competitive against other lvl 40s rather than attempt to keep PvPing with subpar stats and taking a beating most of the time.

I am not sure, how much of a challenge I am in open PvP, since I virtually know nothing about the game, it's mechanics and classes right now. Also I don not excel in PvP. I think there are battlegrounds in the game, which I will have a look at first.

[Darosh]

1. it's a group game. You need a group to be effective for the most part. Tier 1 is a lot of fun.

We already noticed that last evening. Some vaults and dungeons have monsters respawning so very fast it seems very tough to go there alone. But as we have a tank, a healer and a ranged damage dealer, we did not run into any problems. It's a nice change of pace though. Today's MMOs do not seem to emphasize on group play any more apart from random dungeons.
[...]
I am not sure, how much of a challenge I am in open PvP, since I virtually know nothing about the game, it's mechanics and classes right now. Also I don not excel in PvP. I think there are battlegrounds in the game, which I will have a look at first.

Mind you, the game revolves to 95% around PvP ~ not saying you cannot have fun playing PvE, the Warhammer lore alone makes PvE well worth it for the thousands of ToK entries to read through, but unlike in most contemporary (themepark) MMOs your character progression (and the speed thereof) will be almost entirely depend on your PvP 'performance'.

Currently there are only Lairs and one Dungeon (Gunbad) implemented, aside from the various Public Quests - the development time is primarily devoted to getting the PvP aspects of the game up and running, however the Devs plan on re-implementing all the old dungeons and LotD. There is no ETA though, so don't get your hopes up just now if you plan on having a wholesome PvE experience.

With that said, I'd suggest you form a guild with your buddies and find an alliance ~ I'd suggest the RP folk, they are aweasome people and surely willing to help and walk you through the basics of WAR's PvP, whilst giving you a nice show. Don't worry, the PvP on this server isn't 'competitive', it is all in good sport.

Scenarios; the 'battlegrounds' of this game, are accessible to you immediately - you can join them at level 1 and basically level solely through them, if you so fancy. Mind you, the pug scenarios are ... rather frustrating, but - luckily - you joined the game with a group. Stick to your grouping efforts, playing the game alone is very, very tiresome.

I am glad that you enjoy the social aspect of these kind of games, this game in particular will greatly reward you for it.