Stratics Network Exclusive:
Tovin Interviews EA on the New Ultima Online Expansions

Our Stratics Exclusives Reporter, Tovin, had a great opportunity this week to attend a gathering for the Electronic Arts Town Hall meetings in Atlanta and she has written this report on her weekend and its highlights – including more from Darkscribe on the upcoming Kingdom Reborn release.

UO:Kingdom Reborn

Ultima Online is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year and lots of changes are about to occur within the world! The EA Mythic press event was held in January for members of the web , online, tv, and magazine media, and we were presented with the newest of information from the Ultima Online team.

Producer Aaron Cohen and Lead Designer Nick "DragonHead" Corea were there to show off the largest investment EA has made to the game since their acquisition, the newest expansion: Kingdom Reborn. Kingdom Reborn is due out sometime spring of '07. As DragonHead showed off the current Legacy client being used on UO servers, Aaron showed the exact same areas with KR. The new client will be distributed free of charge to subscribers and includes a complete artistry redesign of all areas, and effects. Kingdom Reborn also includes upgrades to the inventory system including a "loot all" button. Also, auto-stacking and one click inventory usage will be available.

Before

New KR Scene

While KR will make the UO we all know and love come to life in a new way, the client upgrade is both free and completely voluntary, for now. All new expansions, including the summer release UO: Stygian Abyss, will require the KR client to be used. Once enough people have downloaded KR phasing out the Legacy client will commence.

Written by Rebecca "Tovin" Simpson - Jan. 28, 2007

Read more of Tovins' interview with EA and Aaron Cohen on the new Ultima Online expansions and renovations here on UO Stratics!

El of LA
Interim Assistant Editor
UO Stratics

DDO a Finalist in the Interactive Achievement Awards!
[26-Jan-2007]

Dungeons and Dragons Online: Stormreach™ has been nominated for MMO of the Year for the 10th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, by the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences. Recognizing the best games of 2006, more than three hundred of the Academy's creative and technical game makers considered nominees for this year's awards.

A complete list of finalists can be found by clicking here.

Litany of the Dead Part Two - Release Notes
[23-Jan-2007]

Several months ago the gates to the Blood Crypt opened and daring adventurers recovered The Heretical Path from the grasp of the vampire Brother Salasso. As a new moon rises over the hills of the Necropolis, Brother Nerezza, the second of the prophets, pens the final verses of The Twisted Apocrypha. The gates to the Shadow Crypt are preparing to open.

In addition to the Black Prophets, the Abbot has a council of four wise and intelligent mortals, chosen from each of the castes of society. These men advise the Abbot on how he may best infiltrate society and increase the scope and power of his cult. As part of their agreement to help him, the Abbot agreed to grant them eternal life by making them an unholy combination of wraiths and shadows. For centuries the Shadow Council has plotted, conspired and carried out plans to increase the size and power of the Abbot’s humanoid cult. They are very clever, intelligent beings, who prefer mind games and subterfuge over straight out hack and slash combat.

With the arrival of the Silver Flame and Emerald Claw, and the loss of the Heretical Path, the Shadow Council has been very busy and active. Their intelligence network has discovered that Dame Calla Swiftmare is more powerful than even the lich realized. Research has uncovered that she may be able to restore the members of the Shadow Council to their former mortal selves. After centuries of servitude, they are now prepared to take that chance.

The members of the Shadow Council have agreed to open the gates of their tombs and provide players assistance in deciphering and solving the puzzles necessary to access and defeat the mummy guardians. With the guardians defeated, the Shadow Crypt will open. The council is bound to service as long as the Brother of Shadow, Nerezza, exists. Dame Calla has agreed to stand before the Black Prophet with the council, defeat the vampire, and free the Shadow Council from its bonds. Once that happens, the council will provide Swiftmare with vital details in defeating the cult and the Black Abbot.

Tomb of the Shadow Guard

Being the lowest ranking of the Black Abbot’s Shadow Council, theShadow Guard’s tomb was allowed to fall into disrepair. When theNecropolis was hit with an earthquake several decades ago, all of thetombs were repaired, except for the Shadow Guard’s. The quake shook andsplit the foundation, and revealed an underground river that flowsbeneath the Shadow Guard’s Tomb. Additionally, the quake caused many ofthe hallways and floors to collapse. Advancing through the tomb willrequire getting a little wet.

Tomb of the Shadow Knight

The Shadow Knight is the second lowest ranking member of the ShadowCouncil. When the council requires someone to go out into the field,the Knight is often the one sent, due to his impressive combatabilities. As such, the Shadow Knight is not often in his tomb andavailable to guard the mummy, so he shares this place with the ShadowRogue, a creature who isn’t actually a shadow but something just asinsidious. The obvious is very rarely the safest.

Tomb of the Shadow King

The Shadow King is the second ranked member of the Shadow Council. Heserves the Abbot without question, but often thinks back on hisprevious life. He prefers to do so in complete darkness, thus theresidents of his tomb have become very powerful while lurking in theshadows. The vampire’s guardian also only awakens when the tomb ispitch-black. The mummy guardian has become quite powerful in thedarkness, and in fact under the King’s tutelage, is invulnerable whilecloaked in shadow. Only a bright blast of intense light renders himvulnerable

Tomb of the Shadow Lord

The Shadow Lord is the leader of the Shadow Council. Taken from thehighest ranks of Sharn’s elite houses millennia ago, he is cunning,ruthless and insidious. His tomb has been designed as a playground forshadows. Creatures of a corporeal nature will find themselves forced tosplit up, then only moments later be looking at each other through thebars that segment this tomb.

Shadow Crypt

The Shadow Crypt is the residence of Brother Nerezza, who has been busyworking on the Twisted Apocrypha. Nerezza has a soft spot in hisblackened heart for tricks and games. His crypt has been built withthis especially in mind. Not many details are known about the ShadowCrypt; only that it stretches and tests the sanity of even the mostseasoned adventurer. The Twisted Apocrypha lies at the bottom of thiscrypt. Recovering it is of the highest priority.


Death Penalty Regen

Death happens, especially in a game with as many heroic opportunitiesas DDO. We’ve heard the prayers of many fallen heroes about experiencedebt, and now you’ll be able to watch your experience debt slowlydisappear over time. Experience debt disappears at roughly 1.5% perhour, whether you’re just relaxing inside one of Stormreach’s many finetaverns or logged off exploring the realms of the real world.


General

• You will now regenerate death XP debt slowly while in town (not in dungeons) or while logged off.
• Wehave fixed a condition where characters could periodically enter astate where healing over time and damage over time effects (includingcity regen, tavern regen, and food) were not working.
• When running a dungeon in solo mode, there is no longer an XP penalty for leaving and reentering.
• Anonymous players will now be able to join parties and post LFM messages without problems.
• Festival Coins will no longer drop. Please turn in any coins you haveto the Festival Jester as he will soon be venturing to new lands.
• We have made some improvements to server performance – everyone should experience faster loading times and less lag.
• Displaying players only LFG in the Who panel should be much snappier now.
• Fixed several incorrect mapnotes.
• Swimming underwater on low or medium graphics settings will no longer produce a strobe-like effect.

UI Improvements

• The /gather emote is now available.
• The highlight on the activated action bar is now more visible.
• Whenyou are creating a party and someone asks to join your group, you willnow be able to send them a tell, accept or decline their invitation,and even open the "create party panel" right from the chat box. This isin addition to the old method of accessing these functions.
• Auctions
  
  • All emails sent regarding auctioned items now include the item name.
  • Whenyou successfully buy out an auction item, you will receive an immediatechat tell message informing you about the successful purchase.
    
• If you switch from one character to another, you should no longer see your previous character listed in the "Who" panel.

Monsters

• Named monsters will no longer idly wander aboutwhen inactive. This should fix a problem that frequently occurred inthe Xorian Cipher where the Urdak brothers would occasionally wander tounreachable locations.
• More spectres have the potential to cast spells.
• Airelementals have never dropped collectibles, but they occasionallydisplayed the collectible effect. They will no longer do this.
• ACand Dexterity scores for hard and elite unnamed spiders were reviewedand in many cases were reduced significantly. The hard version ofregular brown spiders and brown spider princes had their hit pointsreduced as well.
• Mummies will no longer occasionally heal themselves to death.
• Wraiths should no longer attack or cast while invisible and untargetable.
• The "spin attack" of vampires will now actually do damage.

Combat

• Ammunition that is Secured(Item Locked) will no long be automatically loaded if you run out of ammo in your ammo slot.

Spells

• The duration of the Deathward spell has beenincreased to the proper 1 min/level, rather than 1 min + 6s/level itwas previously.
• Chill touch once again caps its damage at 5d6.
• Undead(except for incorporeal undead), vermin, and earth elementals are nolonger immune to the trip portion of the Cometfall spell.
• Sorcerers will now be able to activate Level 6 spell scrolls using a caster level check.

Skills, Feats, & Abilities

• Turn Undead damage has been restored to its full (2d6 + Turning Level + Charisma Modifier). Clerics and Paladins rejoice!
• Wehave changed how Mobile Spellcasting works. Now all players can castwhile on the move with half their normal movement speed. However, withMobile Spellcasting, you can move at full speed. Consequently, theImproved Mobile Spellcasting feat has been removed, as MobileSpellcasting will now have the same effect Improved Mobile Spellcastingpreviously had. Players who had the Improved Mobile Spellcasting featwill gain a single free feat respec.
• The lockpick animation will now take the same amount of time for all races.

Enhancements

• Halfling characters should no longer be ableto get themselves into a state where they are stuck with more than 4enhancements and cannot swap them out.
• The Smite Evil enhancements family has a new icon.
• Favored Enemy (Gnoll) no longer has a blank icon.

Items

• Drops of Ancient Bronze tokens have been greatly increased.
• All Gnoll bane and Goblinoid bane weapons will now get their to-hit and damage bonuses against the correct target types.
• Monsters shaken by the "roaring" effect on several named items will now have a "shaken" fear symbol over their heads.
• Your ears will now be visible when equipping halo or tiara type headgear.
• Gauntletswill no longer be created with minimum required levels that are higherthan level 12 when looting chests in CR 12 dungeons on Elite. Existinggauntlets will not be changed. If you have gauntlets that are higherthan minimum level 13 or higher you can either sell them or hold ontothem for when the character level cap is increased in the future.
• TheTelekinetic effect on Whirlwind and Sirroco has been changed to use aBalance check to resist the knockdown instead of a Trip save. Thismeans that in most cases monsters will now resist the knockdown morethan they did before because most of the monster bonuses (size, numberof legs, etc) are only applied to Balance saves.
• Both thePlanar Gird and the Cape of the Roc will now be found in the Clothingsection of the Auction House. Previously these items were listed in theJewelry section.
• Weapons with spell enhancing effects selectedas quest rewards will now have the correct (much higher) item value anddurability. (This bug affected Sorcerers only.)
• The Ring of Spell Storing will no longer drop as treasure. We haveconcerns over players collecting many of these rings and thereforehaving nearly unlimited spellpoints. The Ring of Spell Storing willreturn when we have addressed these concerns. Existing rings are notaffected.

NPCs

• The missing collectors from House Deneith are now in place with new examples of alchemical goodness to distribute.

Quests

• Monsters that have not yet "entered" the worldwill no longer be able to be triggered prematurely. This will fixseveral dungeons which could be rendered incompletable, including theTwilight Forge Warforged Titan encounter.
• Quest objects likealtars will no longer be immune to energy types like fire, ice, holy,etc. and will no longer be immune to spells like Fireball and Cone ofCold that deal these types of damage.
• The Circle of Eternity
  
  • Fixed an AI issue that caused several fire elementals to become stuck.
• The Court of Lailat
  
  • The first encounter with Queen Lailat will now reset if all the players in her throne room die.
    
• Gate of Nightmares
  
  • Iorrat will no longer respawn.
    
• Grey Moon's Den
  
  • Brother Qessul of Sorrowdusk has increased his power. He now has more hp and a new spell.
  • The hard versions of the human, elf, and halfling hunters will use their bows correctly again.
    
• Haunted Library
  
  • Moved a trap control box so that it is actually accessible to players.
    
• Irestone Inlet
  • We fixed a kobold who erroneously had a mini-boss name.
    
• The Necropolis
  • The Necropolis has received a face-lift. Who did it? Why did it happen…nobody knows….
  • Raddha Cross will now refer to the vampire using his proper name.
  • The Bloody Crypt
    
    • You will no longer be able to repeat The Bloody Crypt without repeatingthe four previous dungeons in the chain (Tomb of the Burning Heart,Tomb of the Crimson Heart, Tomb of the Immortal Heart, and Tomb of theSanguine Heart).
      
  • Tomb of the Crimson Heart
    
    • The Shrouded Horror that once spawned in this dungeon has been replaced with a more appropriate CR monster.
      
• The Sands of Menechtarun
  • Vorvand Darkfur's chest should now unlock when he dies.
    
• Spawn of Whisperdoom
  • Fixed several optional objectives so that they can now be completed.
    
• Spire of Validus
  • Improved DM Text with better feedback regarding the Lich’s treasure room.
  • The primary villain in the Spire of Validus has been running low ondecent corpses. He will no longer unleash skeletal ambushes onopponents that have returned to Stormreach, and the skeletons createdin these ambushes are sadly of shoddier construction (the magicanimating these skeletons will fail after a time).
• Splinterskull
  • TheHobgoblin Warden now drops 1 West Storeroom Key and 1 East StoreroomKey instead of 2 East Storeroom Keys (this was happening on the Eliteversion only).
    
• Three-Barrel Cove
  
  • The Fire Caves
    
    • Adjusted the lava depth and added a ledge to help ensure players could reach a chest.
      
• The Vulkoor Spiral
  
  • Calyx Shattermoon will only give you one copy of the Blessed Blood Offering at a time.
    
• Vault of Night
  
  • Prison of the Mind
    
    • This quest will no longer be counted twice for both House Kundarak favor and Total favor.

The Journal Of Dame Calla Swiftmare

Knight of the Argent Fist

“I am the hand of the Silver Flame. Its purity infuses my soul, its righteous anger flows through my body. Repent, sinner, or I must share it with you.”

7 Aryth:

Through the grace of the Silver Flame, I have survived to write another entry in this journal. Always, I feel the gaze of Tira Miron watching me from afar, urging me to hold back nothing in my sacrifice for our faith, just as Tira gave herself to become the Flame that guides us all.

Our detachment of Argent Fist paladins reached the Necropolis and established its camp, although not without bloodshed. We were challenged by the formidable Brother Salasso, but some local adventurers helped us defeat him and obtain the Heretical Path. If we can retrieve the other two tomes, we will put an end to the Black Abbot’s dreams of ascending to godhood.

I am wary of working with the Emerald Claw. We have a common goal, but will they stay true to their word and work with us to eliminate this perilous threat? I don’t trust them, even though the Voice of the Flame assures me that their help is indispensable.

Our next objective is to retrieve the Twisted Apocrypha from Brother Nerezza, the vampire tasked with scripting the second tome. He has the assistance of a council comprised of the Black Abbot's most trusted aides -- the so-called Shadow Council -- although I wonder whether the Shadow Council or Brother Nerezza is truly in charge. The journey into the Shadow Crypt will be our most harrowing challenge yet. May the Silver Flame banish all the shadows between ourselves and victory.

I understand the dire need that has called me to serve here, but I cannot help thinking about my mother in her illness. Please, Tira, continue to watch over her. I hope I can defeat the vile Abbot soon, so that I may return to her side before she passes out of my hands, and into your own.

8 Aryth:

I had retired to my tent for the night after a long day of research and prayer when suddenly the air around me became very cold as darkness enveloped me. The unholy council appeared out of thin air before me. The four shadows approached as my hand reached down for my weapon. My thoughts quickly turned to my ill mother, as I felt an overwhelming sense of fear sweep over me. One of them began to speak, it sounded like a cross between the harsh aggressive winds of a storm and the sound of fingernails scraping slate. He informed me that they sought an audience with the all powerful Knight of the Argent Fist. I heard him out, keeping my hand firmly wrapped around the hilt of my sword, the Enduring Conviction. He told me they would help me defeat the Black Abbot. In return I would have to help free them of their service to him. They would come again when the moons of Sypheros and Barrakas were full, giving me three weeks to decide. As quickly as they had arrived, they were gone. What remained was the most difficult decision I will ever have to face. I sensed a great evil in them, though I could tell their visit was without nefarious intentions. I know you have the answers I seek Tira, I pray you will find me worthy to share them with.

10 Aryth:

None of my training, prayer or research could have prepared me for this, Tira. I still have yet to make much of the Shadow Council’s proposition. I have been able to ascertain from my recent encounter that they are half-wraith, half-shadow and all powerful. Throughout my career in service to the Silver Flame, I have battled countless agents of evil, never once have I had to work together with them. Although the fact that we are working so closely with the Emerald Claw proves to me that anything is possible.

I had assumed I would have seen this in all my prayer. The Silver Flame should have allowed me to see this coming. Now I am left with are questions. I have less than three weeks to figure this all out.

Is the council capable of being trusted? Will my prayer lead me to the right decision?

My main task is to ensure the Black Abbot does not achieve his goal. Ultimately what is more important? Completing my quest or staying true to my faith? Is it possible to do both?

It is so hard to keep my focus when my thoughts turn to mother. Especially after the letter I received today. It is most troubling news indeed that her condition has worsened. I need to stay focused on the task at hand. Please, Tira show me the way.

12 Aryth:

I have begun to seek answers to these questions I have. The Shadow Council is comprised of the four members I encountered the other night. There seems to be a definitive hierarchy amongst their ranks. The Lord must have been the one that spoke to me. There is also the Shadow Guard, the Shadow Knight, and the Shadow King. These four were hand picked to be the council by the Black Abbot.

I will look into their pasts at a later date, for now I am concerned about their connection to the Abbot and if they can be trusted or not. They seem to be quite a powerful group. I don’t fully know what they are fully capable of yet, but their display a few days ago was impressive and will warrant much more research before encountering them again.

Why would this group that has been with the Abbot for so long, all of a sudden want to turn against him? Were they enlisted against their will by the Abbot? If they were, perhaps they truly want to be rid of the control he has over them.

Tira, please voice my concerns to the Silver Flame. I have been one of her most reliable servants and I do all that I should without question. In this, my most dire moment I require her divine direction. Give me a sign that I am on the right path and please let me know my mother is being watched over. I fear I may never see her again.

15 Aryth:

My research of late has produced very little in the way of results. It has been much harder to find information about this Shadow Council than I had originally thought. I may need to seek other avenues for information; if that involves arranging a meeting with the Emerald Claw that is what I must do. There have been whispers that Kai-Teng Fairuza has also been approached by the Shadow Council. Could they be trying to drive a stake through the fragile relationship between the two organizations, or is their plan for us to all work together? Regardless of what they have planned, I should seek out and speak with Kai-Teng as soon as possible. He may very well be facing a similar dilemma. It might also help me to deal with this if there is someone that will understand the sort of plight I am in. I must admit, it would be nice to speak with someone else instead of communicating all my thoughts to you, Tira. I don’t even know if my thoughts are getting to you.

I need to meditate and pray some more. That will clear my mind. Tomorrow I will seek an audience with Kai-Teng Fairuza and speak with him about the Shadow Council.

Warhammer Online!

Once upon a time, this world was at peace. There was an Empire that cared for its people and lands, and prosperity was abundant. The people of the land had few worries in their lives...

Until the plague came.

Then the world as they knew it changed forever. Out of the peace and tranquility of their past came the nightmarish horror of their future. A plague ravaged the land and its people, creating havoc across the Empire. This was no ordinary plague... some may even believe it was created from unnatural forces. For instead of death, this plague brought life... a twisted, mutilated life to the people it affected. Out of the rubble of its wake, a new breed was born to the land. A breed of hunters.

Meanwhile, there is trouble brewing on the borders of the Empire (isn't there always?)... the forces of Chaos are planning an attack upon the ravaged lands of the Emporer. Malekith, Lord of the Dark Elves, is not to be left behind, and begins plotting his own part in this unfolding nightmare. He seeks the Empire for himself, believing it to be his birthright that has been denied him for millennia.

A battle of epic proportions ensues, and many lives are lost. The ancient Dwarven home of Karak Eight Peaks has fallen, and the Empire is on the brink of disaster. A sudden eclipse of the sun has caused untold panic across the Empire. The forces of Chaos are achieving success of their plans, while the Empire and its allies are struggling to survive in this new world. Humans, Dwarfs, and High Elves have joined forces to create the Armies of Order, to do battle against the Greenskins (Orcs and Goblins), Dark Elves, and Chaos.

The Age of Reckoning has begun.

Here at Stratics Central, we are making it our business to keep you informed on the hottest games out there. We are working hard to bring the information to you so that you, the MMORPG community, can get the latest news on the titles available in the industry today.

To that end, we would like to introduce to you Warhammer Stratics!

Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning is one of the most anticipated games of the year, and is brought to you by the creators of Dark Age of Camelot, EA Mythic. Based on Game Workshop's title Warhammer®, EA Mythic brings a new style of play in the form of Realm vs. Realm (RvR), Player vs. Player (PvP), and Player vs. Environment (PvE) together in one world. All aspects of the game, including quests, have an impact upon the overall war in some way. This is a unique form of immersion into the game that is poised to revolutionize how developers envision a player's impact on a story line and ever-changing online world.

We are pleased to bring you Warhammer Stratics, providing you with the latest news and reviews on the game, all of the information on game updates, as well as an area to discuss your victories and defeats at the hands of the Armies of Order or the Hordes of Destruction. Join us at Warhammer Stratics today!

Enhancements Overview
aka: 5 things you need to know about the enhancement overhaul

1. Each action point is important.

As you level, you gain action points. As you spend your action points to buy enhancements, your old enhancements don’t go away. You never have to ‘unslot’ an enhancement in order to fit a new one in. Instead, enhancements build on each other. While before you got new, more powerful versions of old enhancements automatically as you leveled up, with the old ones disappearing, now your old versions stick around. You can then choose to spend more action points and buy the better version or buy an entirely new enhancement instead.

2. Go for depth, or go for breadth.

The removal of slots means that you are no longer limited to only 4 different types of enhancements. You can choose to spread your points out and dabble a little bit in everything, or you can choose instead to specialize in fewer enhancement lines. Multi-class characters will find that while they cannot specialize in an enhancement line as far as a pure-class character can, they have many more enhancement lines available for purchase, giving them greater versatility at the cost of specialization.

3. Available enhancements will be familiar

Have a favorite enhancement that you want to keep? Chances are that you’ll still be able to get it. The majority of existing enhancements will remain in some form; some will be split into multiple enhancements; most will have a rebalancing of the numbers. Players who feel like they’ve built themselves around specific enhancements shouldn’t feel like they have to reroll, while the difference between the enhancement ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’ will be reduced as the power of enhancements goes down.

4. Automatic conversion.

Upon logging in, all players will automatically have their current enhancements wiped, and an appropriate amount of total action points applied to their character. From that point, all you have to do is go to the same trainer you always do and buy whatever new enhancements you want.

5. New enhancements to buy

In addition to the familiar enhancements, players will find many entirely new enhancement lines available for purchase –enhancements that improve a cleric’s turning ability, give extra uses per day of action boosts, or allow spellcasters to use wands to greater effect for example.

This is the first article of two about the new enhancements system - the second article will provide more of the specifics.

Stratics Exclusive Preview: Corum Online

With Beta just released, Calell, a member of the Stratics Exclusives Team, has put together a preview of the newest MMO from GPotato, Corum Online. In this game, dungeons are not just simple areas that people fight monsters in, but areas that guilds and clans can take over and control!

Siege dungeons are capturable, with a guardian residing on the lowest level. The purpose is to encourage ongoing battle for control of the dungeon guardian, which grants the 'ruler' absolute loyalty of the guardian as well as a weapon of protection. Vigilance is necessary should you gain control of a dungeon, since battles and wars can cause turnover to another group.

Read more about their classes, and a fresh take on player versus player gameplay in OUR REVIEW!

Stratics Exclusive - Interview With Grimwell, EQII's New Community Manager!

When developers hand us lemons we turn to our community managers and demand lemonade! Craig "Grimwell" Dalrymple is the latest person to take on this job. We sat down with him to find out how he was handling it.

Stratics: What do you enjoy most about your new job?

Grimwell: I really enjoy the people. When you are looking at a game company from the "outside-in" viewpoint, it's difficult to really get an idea of how the people in the company relate to each other. What I am finding here at SOE is that the people are nice, and a lot of fun. Add with such a strong community behind EQII, it is an ideal situation.

Learn more about EQ2's new Community Manager in our exclusive interview.

Stratics Exclusive: Age of Conan Preview

Darkness and hushed voices fill your head as you move with your bretheren to conquer the castle. Suddenly, all around you push into action as your leader gives the call. You see nothing but red as you bring the enemy down! Where else could you be but playing Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures?

Along with the mature and in-depth storyline, the game will include a single person game as you learn how to progress. Instead of being dumped into a huge world with other individuals, you will be pulled into the story while learning the mechanics of the game. A first for MMO’s, this feature will develop your character as a part of the universe, and I believe it will be the only game to make you feel as if you were truly a part of the game. Most games you are a player, not one of the characters. In Conan, become one of the great legends, and fight in the giant battles of war!

READ MORE about this dark and imposing game. Will you become one of the greatest warriors ever?

WoW Stratics Cast #3 is up and ready. Here is what Jacan covered this week:

• 00:10 - Intro
• 01:58 - US World of Warcraft News… TCG launches World of Warcraft Regional Qualifier Tournaments
• 4 New Realms Open
• 3 New Forum opened on the US forums
• Technical Support extends their opening hours
• More Security to your account to help prevent hackers getting access
• Another Free Transfer Round opened last week
• 08:12 - EU World Of Warcraft News Netherwelp problems in European Collectors Edition
• End Of The Burning Crusade Beta Test
• Blizzard Tech and Billing Support extend their hours in honor of TBC Release
• 10:28 - EU/US World of Warcraft News World of Warcraft reaches 8 million subscribers
• Highlord Kruul Unleashed
• 14:37 - The Week In Blue
• 17:00 - Music: Myndflame - MC Raiders

Play Now:
Direct Link to WoW Stratics Cast Show #3
Note: File size is 26.6 MB

Monster Profile: Warforged Titan
[11-Jan-2007]

From the personal journal of Azalai Korias, Elven Wizard:

Warforged are properly classified as Living Constructs – theypossess free will and sentience, while combining aspects of bothconstructs and living creatures. In Khorvaire, they were perfected in965 YK by House Cannith to fight in the Last War, and were based onearlier models that lacked true living construct qualities. Theseearlier models were often quite large, and included the massive titans.

Rumor has it that adventurers have found an ancient creation forge herein Xen’drik, protected by warforged guardians thousands of years old. Apriceless find if the rumor is true, but a terribly dangerous weaponshould it fall into the wrong hands.

I cannot help but admit my skepticism at the idea of warforged hiddenaway and surviving for tens of thousands of years. I will believe thesestories only once I see this forge with my own eyes, or witness a partydragging back the salvage.
_________________________________________________

Creature Name: Warforged Titan
Creature Type: Construct
Environment: Unknown
Attack: Giant maul, Giant axe, or other attacks possible
Special: Ground shake, Energy weapon
Organization: Usually solitary

Stories have come and gone over the years of massive mechanizedmenaces, gigantic warforged creations capable of leveling a house in amatter of seconds. Until recently I believed there were none of thesemetal monstrosities near Stormreach. That belief has sadly been provenwrong as reports of adventuring parties obliterated by a titan flowinto the city now on a fairly regular basis. There is a Warforged Titannear Stormreach after all. Luckily, the reports seem to confirm thatthe behemoth is confined to a specific facility of some kind and so isunable to make a direct assault on Stormreach proper, at least for now.

Not completely construct but not true living Warforged, a WarforgedTitan is a truly incredible war machine. We know that these giantadvanced constructs were used to devastating effect during the LastWar. Their combination of incredible strength, powerful attacks, andconstruct immunities makes them almost unstoppable in battle. But thatis when you try to fight them on their terms.

While massive and possessed of extreme power, these titans have aweakness. They have little intelligence and do not have a mind forstrategy. If you battle them with the proper tactics, using theenvironment at hand strategically, they can be made vulnerable and canin fact be defeated. Now, you may think that this is easily said by me,someone who has never actually seen this new titan, and you would beright. However, after analyzing the information given to me by thosewho have had first hand experience with this beast, I’ve come to theconclusion that this titan can eventually be made low.

Some ragged survivors have given me good information on this particulararmored giant. Apparently, this titan has been partially reconstructedby what must be highly intelligent beings and has a new and devastatingranged energy weapon of some kind. I am told that this weapon is thetitan’s greatest strength and is to be avoided at all costs.

Whenever possible, take advantage of the low intelligence behind all ofthat armor. Lead the titan into an area where the ground is unstable orwhere heavy objects like boulders can be dropped down. If you are ableto get the titan down, seize the moment. Closing to melee range withthe titan is hazardous but has the advantage of limiting the energyweapon because at close range the titan will prefer to swing at you.Only those with heavy armor and the ability to absorb massive amountsof damage will be able to survive the titan’s melee onslaught, however,and then for only a short time.

A paladin who barely survived his battle with the titan told of somesort of energy device in the titan’s area that his companion managed tocommandeer for a short time. After powering up this device with anearby fuel source, this heroic person brought the device to bear onthe titan, and to great effect, but died during his second attempt.

As in many tough battles, unified action by the party with each memberfocusing on what he or she does best is the key to success. Avoidingthe titan’s attacks while using the environment to your advantage isthe way to victory, that and a lot of defense.

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