So there I was standing in the Maw…anxiously awaiting this moment that I had been yearning for with such unrivaled anticipation. I was planning to vid the entire thing of course, and so I hammered away at the video key for XFire and discovered with a growing sense of dread that nothing was happening. I tried reloading and realized that my failure was because I was logged into the test server. So yeah….
Alas, there will be no video here tonight. What I can do, however, is give all of you good people a summation of the experience along with the screenies I took. I apologize for my vid failure and I will have that all sorted out for the next round of testing on Thursday. So on to the new City Sieges…as tonight we would be testing the Inevitable City.
We gathered together at the entrance behind the Maw and begun the stalwart tradition of hurry up and wait. Organizing all of the Warbands was no small feat, so we spent a good bit of time just waiting for Andy and the rest of Mythic to get everything sorted out. As most of you already know, the new City Sieges are 24 v 24 battles involving three stages. Once we were given the go, we zoned in to find Emporer Karl Franz standing before us in all his glory.
The first stage involves breaching the palace gates and battling over 6 different control points. Each control point is armed with siege weaponry and once that is destroyed, an NPC called a Sapper will run in and set a bomb that will take the control point for either side once it explodes. So we charged forth from the gates and made our way to the first control point…expecting to see a herd of rabid Destro at any moment…
The Sapper is highlighted with a shining beam to help distinguish him from a crowd, and once you down the weapons he will come stampeding towards you to set his bomb.
We did not run into Destro for some time at the beginning, as I think Mythic wanted to make sure the mechanics were all working correctly. But it did not take much longer before we finally met our foes in heated battle and the result would be a portent of things to come. Some of the control points are positioned in areas surrounded by hazard, as they stand just above the narrow walkways that litter parts of the Inevitable City.
With nothing preventing you from being launched off, knockback abilities became devastatingly powerful as many were catapulted into the abyss. Positioning can be key here, and I was fortunate to meet my maker from enemy fire and not from the latest onslaught of Order tossing.
The goal here is to take the points leading up to the palace gates, then downing the gates as quickly as possible. There is another mechanic to help you do this faster, but since we never quite got that far I am unable to comment further on Stage 1. So far, the entire experience did feel like an improvement even if we were consistently being thwarted by UI problems and occasional bugs. With Destro winning Stage 1, we gathered back up next to Karl Franz as the realm Warlords prepared to enter the fray for Stage 2.
For Stage 2, each realm has 2 Warlords who emerge and make their way to the palace gates. Your mission is to escort your own Warlords safely or defeat the enemy Warlords before they reach their destination. These Warlords can be healed and ignore player attacks. It should also be noted that as the Warlords proceed through the city, if they happen to bump into each other during the journey they will fight to the death.
We did our best to defend our Warlords but they fell rather briskly to the Destro forces. One of the issues we had during this Stage was spawning, as we kept respawning back at the middle control point where the entire Destro warband was busy carving our limbs into fashionable decorative arrangements. So this became a spawn-camping fest that did not go over well with some. We were told later that this will be looked at, as Andy reminded all of us that the purpose of testing was to evaluate how things were working.
Once again, the entire process felt much more refined and personal than it did before. All three stages happen no matter who wins, as both realms acquire victory points from the various City Siege instances in order to decide the outcome. I like the very specific objectives that we were tasked with here. It was more far more interesting than the current sieges at this point.
With Destro winning Stage 2, the war moved to Stage 3 at the main entrance to the city. If Order had been victorious in Stage 2 then this fight would have taken place inside the palace itself, I believe. We huddled next to our King as he attempted to rally the troops with his best Aragorn impression.
Once Karl Franz was finished stretching his lungs, he chose 4 Champions among us, one from each archetype (tank, ranged dps, melee dps, healer). This happens with both realms, followed by each King leading his 4 Champions and the rest of the warbands into a glorious climactic battle with the fate of the city hanging in the balance. One thing I will say is that the 4 players chosen as Champions must have promptly guzzled some of that juice that Merry and Pippin smuggled to buff their size. Once you are selected as a Champion you morph into hyper-inflated version of yourself!
Each Champion has extra abilities as well, though I do believe some people were not able to access the icons necessary to perform them. This will be looked at I am sure. But the goal in Stage 3 is simple, you must take out the 4 Champions of the opposing realm and then topple their King. The battle was intensely chaotic, with all manner of spells and abilities being slung about in every direction.
At the end of the day, Destruction completed their clean sweep of all three Stages and defeated us. So with that being said, let’s get to the heart of my first reaction to the whole experience. We all know how maligned the current City Sieges are and how we all wish they were different. The sense of disappointment from within the player base has always been palpable with regards to this subject.
Some expectations are probably impossible to meet, as I’m sure that many players envision huge lag-less battles involving hundreds on each side. For those more rational, we just hoped that Mythic would go back and tend to their endgame. We prayed for a day when they would craft their sieges into something that would truly feel rewarding at the close of a hard-fought campaign of zone control.
For those in the latter category you can now breathe a sigh of relief.
This entire City Siege just felt more relevant this time around, its impact more immediate than the current versions. There were opportunities for strategy, there were specific goals to complete that felt more involved than the current sieges…the entire feeling I got was one of vast improvement. Every moment felt just a little bit more engaging with the new design. The sinking feeling that so overwhelmed my thoughts back when I first saw the City Sieges after launch was completely absent.
The majority of testers seemed to be genuinely enthused by the proceedings. There were particularly loud howls on vent as the Champions were chosen in Stage 3 and we all surged forward against the enemy King and his Champions/warband. I had never heard that kind of joy on vent during the sieges we have now, and that speaks an awful lot to the progress Mythic is making here. This is a step in the right direction.
With our appetite for exploring these new City Sieges barely sated, we held a feedback session with Mythic once all of the instances were complete. This was just the first step in the testing process and there are certainly a number of bugs to fix. But I walked away from this event with a deep smile etched onto my face, which is a noticeable enhancement from my reaction the first time I witnessed the current version of Warhammer’s endgame.
A huge thanks goes out to Mythic and my fellow Gaiscioch testers! I can’t wait to get back at it this Thursday!!! And yes, this time there will be video. I promise! 
nightwreath
