A) Pre-order online for delivery or pick up of the game and get an open beta AND headstart/items code emailed to you.
OR
B) Sign up for fileplanet monthly subscription for $6.95, then cancel before next month.
http://www.fileplanet.com/subscribe/subscribe_tt.shtml

Mythic is using fileplanet to distribute the open beta, you'll need:
- Mythic master account, can create new or recover old DaoC account
- Fileplanet account, free if you have pre-order, or paid to just try it

Once you have the Fileplanet account, get their downloader, get the 10Gig file (I ran mine overnight). If you have the subscription prior to download as a member you'll get instant download and a better speed. My downloader synched up to my account without any input from me.

There is another fileplanet page to request the open beta code be emailed to you, I think it also stores it in your fileplanet account. Put that code into your Mythic master account and wait for 9/7.

A $1 buck a day for 7 day open beta to test drive Warhammer.
What a country!


Azzi

So no free open beta? =( Yeah I know I'm a cheap/poor bastard if I can't even pay 7 bucks but does anyone know if there will be a refer a friend like on WoW?

Not that I've heard of. CE might have an invite but it isn't something I've heard mentioned.

Good luck getting a fileplanet beta account tho. They were probably gone within 5 seconds of them announcing it, and if people learned one thing from those stupid Fileplanet betas, they are a VERY limited amount.

So in all honestly, I would not even persue this. Sure it's 7 bucks, but it's only a week till release.

Who the fuck cares about playing a beta anyhow?

You forget, plenty of people in the world think differently than you do.

I know but the game comes out in a week right? Seems like the infatuation with a beta would die down by now.

If I didn't have my open beta key in hand I would be a bit pissed about waiting for "only a week until release". For people who have been waiting a long time to give the game a try, much longer than a week, a mere "one week" seems like an eternity. But either way, 7 bucks is hardly that much to ask considering the amount of bang for your buck you'll get in terms of entertainment. Cost/pleasure-wise, it's pretty far up there, just like most MMORPGs.

I'm not too enthralled by the game, I don't care for PVP so Warhammer isn't something I'm dying to try. I'm not much of a lore nut so I never follow games before they're released really. I know Warcraft nerds were jizzing in their pants when they heard about the MMO, but I simply waited until the public stress test (which was free from Fileplanet, because my dad was a subscriber way back when).

I won't jump through hoops to play, but I understand that some people would. But like I said, a week ain't much to wait. I won't even be picking the game up at launch, I'm still pretty certain that the game is doomed to fail and not live up to the hype.

I just saw this post, went to fileplanet and got my open beta invite/key. So much for luck I guess. :p

_________________

I dunno, DAoC just celebrated its 7 year anniversary. While its certainly not even a pimple on WoW's ass, it still has a fan base. I think Warhammer is a niche game. WoW does PVE and PVP. Warhammer does PVP, and does it better than WoW does... by a long shot. So if all of the WoW PVP clones really want to experience a better player versus player experience, they will find more enjoyment out of Warhammer (early on, at least). The newness of the game may wear off, but I really don't think it will. I think they set the game up to succeed and continue to show signs that they know what they are doing in that department. Hell, just not having "official" boards is a step in the right direction, if you ask me. When it is all said and done, WoW will not be hurt by Warhammer, but I think the market is ready for another quality game to come along and give people something new and refreshing. Vanguard was a piece of shit when it was released and Conan still doesn't have an identity. Warhammer won't appeal to everyone, of course, but I think the ones who actually play the game and know what to expect will find it a pretty fun experience. And that, my friends, is how you feed a troll.

I'm not trolling, I sincerely don't believe that War will do very well, I don't even think it will hit a million subscribers. Did AoC ever hit that?

I think WoW will pick up whatever it is that War is doing and that won't help them very much.

This is more for folks on the fence about Warhammer.
$7 bucks play for a week in open beta and check it out.

If you know someone already with a fileplanet account, get the open beta code from them. Free.

Yeah Azzi is right, I just wanted to trial the game without paying 50 bucks for it.

A fun PvP system that actually makes sense and rewards you for playing well? Or shit, for even participating in it at all. One can only hope. It's only been 3 years or so and they have failed every step at attempting it thus far.

If they can take the nod and fit even half of the Warhammer PvP system into WoW, it would only go to improve the PvP side of the game.

So far they've tried to emulate it. Lake Wintergrasp is shit.

At this point, Givin, you're so full of vitriol toward WoW that it's hard to take your comparative reviews seriously.

As for WAR's success, the real measure will be whether or not they start adding lots of PvE content, at which point it'll be a "failure" as a PvP game. Which I think will happen, I still don't believe that a "PvP MMO" can truly exist in this market.

So what was DAoC?

Hint: It was very successful, and very much pvp centered and only succumbed to age. Ask anyone and they will also tell you the "PvE" server they put up has always been a ghost town.

You must have been playing the other world of warcraft I guess. The one where people didn't afk their way to season 1 and 2 welfare suits, and your battleground must have had some variety after 3 plus years of being out. Or the one that didn't take three seasons to sort out losing to even better welfare epics or rating selling teams. Or maybe the one where every bad on the planet got Gladiator at the end of 3.

You wonder why I hate WoW PvP? Because it's garbage held together by two ton of band aids. As far as you taking me serious or not, you should know I could care less what you think on the topic. I take you about as serious as people take xskycrasherx on anything.

So, there will be no AFKer's in Warhammer? How do these RvR BG's work compared to WoW, Givin? There will be no real end to the game I take it, and people need to kill to get any kind of honor and stuff

That's just it. Any "PvP game" is going to risk the same pitfalls of every game that has come before. First and foremost are the players themselves, most players are more than willing to break a system for their own benefit. Don't think that "AFK'ers" are some plague unique to WoW, nor are hackers or any other form of exploitation.

Same with Instanced PvP. WAR might be new, and it might even be better, but eventually people will realize that instanced PvP is...well...instanced PvP.

PvP as an endgame typically burns people out extremely fast as well simply due to repetition and a lack of content. Will the "end-game" stuff be extremely quick to acquire (Causing speedy burnout.) or will it be difficult? (Risking a "PvP grind".)

Can WAR pull it off? I actually kinda hope so, because I'd like to see a "PvP MMO", but my prediction remains that it will begin hemorrhaging subscribers and be pushed into producing plenty of PvE content to keep people interested, at which point it will be a failure as a "PvP MMO".

It's not all instanced PVP.

Givin summed it up nicely there, WoW PVP has been pretty boring for a while now, and it's one of the only things that has been making me come back for more. The biggest problem is that you have a huge base in WoW of rabid PVE fanbois that will balk at any new largescale addition of more PVP mechanic-centered gameplay. That's what WAR is offering, and on DAY ONE you can start smashing face and level up your character at the same time. WoW doing that? Hah, good luck.

WAR has at least promised more PVP-centered gameplay. With WoW we've had the SAME battlegrounds for 3+ years, with the "latest addition" being Eye of the Storm which came out a 1.5 years ago. What a flow of content! We've had the same old arenas too, finally I guess we're getting a new one a year after Ruins of Lordaeron. All we see is continuous updates of gear with crappy graphic changes. No new gameplay, no new terrain to fight in. I seriously want to /wrist myself when I step into an Alterac Valley for the 238934th time just to get enough honor for a piece of S4(I've actually had it for a while, but it was PAINFUL to get - not because it was hard, but because it was boring as all shit).

And yea, Lake Wintergrasp looks like utter shit. Same old failed World PVP concepts. Yay.

Needless to say, I'm REALLY looking forward to WAR and actually being able to fight in a map that isn't called Arathi Basin.

You realize they some what combined endgame pvp and pve right? There are just as many non pvp instanced options as there is instanced through out the game starting at level 1-10.

Lake Wintergrasp will award 7500 Honor and 150 Arena Points. Yes, you can now get Arena Points without doing the Arena. How long before Honor goes by the wayside? I enjoyed WoW PVP in the beginning. I personally thought the old Honor System, with High Warlords & Grand Marshalls, as flawed as it was, was better than the current state of things. I've always been the type who wanted to reward accomplishments. I don't think a guy on a crappy Arena team should be able to get the same gear as a guy on a 2100+ rated team. Blizzard is finally moving away from their old model and putting the personal rating requirements on some gear, but I still think it's too little, too late. The damage was already done. This will all be moot when the expansion comes out, of course, because nobody at level 80 is going to want to be sporting Arena Season 4 gear, but they already lost me.

Givin had a good idea in another thread. You make weapons that give some sort of bane damage advantage in PVP but are not as effective in PVE. As mentioned, in Warhammer, the minute you install the game and create a character, you can begin to PVP, if that is your choice. You can spend all of your time in the Scenarios if that is your preference. If you go in as a level 1 freshly minted Dwarf, the game will automatically raise you level 8 so you can at least contribute. I am sure WoW will eventually do something similar, but to me, they've already blew it in the PVP department. And while I consider myself a "PVE First" type of player, I am glad for a fresh start with a new game. Maybe it'll suck, maybe I'll get frustrated and quit. I just know I am eager for something different and Warhammer has so far shown me that it is polished enough to pull me away from WoW. Even if it is a PVP game.

I don't know that PvP ends in burnout. I played FPS's for a lot of years. If they can get the PVP integrated into gameplay with progression, it will do well. Now if I could just figure out which fning career to play.

People need to remember WoW is a PvE game, with PvP elements. Warhammer should have much better PvP because its a PvP game Makes sense no?

That's only in beta so that people can quickly buy gear off the vendors for testing. It won't be the case in live.



Oh come now, that's just blatant "The good old days were so good!" stuff right there. No one can seriously think that was a good system.

The current system has its issues, but it's still pretty darn decent. A guy on a crappy team getting the same gear as a 2100+ rated team? What? Season 4 (Or even season 3) weapons?

As for Wintergrasp, c'mon. We all know Blizzard has failed at world PvP elements, but lets give em a fair chance. How many of us have played a finished version? Beta content is beta, folks.



I've often thought about that. If an MMO could capture the fun of FPS play in a system with the depth and longevity to keep people paying/playing, it'd be awesome.

The problem is that, on a tactical level, MMO's tend to have very low skill ceilings. They tend to shine on more strategic levels, but that usually doesn't lend itself to the exciting fights that people think of in FPS games. But remove that strategic element (Like I think Age of Conan was trying to do.) and you end up with very shallow, quickly repetitive and boring PvP.

WoW actually has some of the best tactical and strategic elements in any MMO, period. What it lacks are the proper systems to govern/encourage play and arenas in which to have the fights.

If WAR can pull it off, I'd cancel WoW in a heartbeat. I just dunno how they'll do it.

Just because they call it an open beta does not make it an open beta. Open betas are not pay to play.

For your information, I did like the old PVP system. I didn't like how extreme they made it, but I liked the idea of one High Warlord/Grand Marshall and others ranked below that person. If you wanted the badass gear, you busted your ass and you got it. The server bullshit that went along with it, with people screwing others out of positions even after they came up with agreements about who would finish in what place sucked for some people, but I still thought it was a pretty cool system. I was never one of those that wanted to be HW/GM, so it didn't hurt me. I didn't have to sit around in Crossroads all day and night PVPing between AV/AB/WSG queue times that lasted 2+ hours. I queued with some friends who were going for GM, I helped them out, and I got to like rank 6 or something, which was fine by me.

And to clear the air once and for all, since you are too fucking stupid to realize that we already know this. I know that they have personal rating requirements NOW for SOME ITEMS. I know that SSC and TK is "old content" so anyone complaining about the gear there vs. any other gear available should be laughed at because there is newer and better content to be killed with newer and better gear to be obtained. All of this is known by me and everyone else who has ever made an argument against things in the game. Your only comeback is to quote again and again that things are different now. Well no shit. Things are different, but they are still fucked up. As I said in the post above, they are making strides to fix things that I think are wrong, but they are doing it too late, in my opinion. You can act like things are perfect but they are not.

ps: Season 3 weapons only required a personal rating of 1850 from the start (down to 1800 now) so outside of 1 item (shoulders), a person on a crappy team could get the same gear as someone with a 2100 rating. Season 4 added some extra personal rating requirements, but even those did not matter with people selling teams & ratings. If a shitty person wanted full Season 4 gear, he/she could get it with a little gold and one evening doing Arenas (assuming he already had Arena points saved up, which everyone does). If a shitty person wanted GM gear back in the day, he did not have to be the best player in the land, but he still had to bust his ass night and day for it. I prefer the game this way. I prefer a game without badges and badge gear. I prefer a game that rewards time and effort. You don't.

What the hell are you even talking about? How does PvE relate here? All I did was counter your assertion that "crappy teams" (You didn't specify a rating here) get the "same gear" as a 2100+ rated team. Which is false, and it didn't just get that way. How you managed to bring PvE and other shit into it boggles me.



Are you shitting me? Did you even play back then? All the old system rewarded were people that could play 24/7, had AFK bots, or had multiple people playing the characters. Don't even try to paint it as a "hard work for rewards" system because anyone that played it back then knows better.

You say I don't prefer that kind of game? You're damn right. The old system was the most retarded thing ever, and everyone who played then knew it. How you can try to paint it as anything but a retarded grind of absolutely epic proportions that not even EQ could compare to is beyond me.

Of course I played back then. I know there were problems with AFKers but luckily I was on a server that didn't have that problem. By and large, the people who got GM/HW on my server were the dedicated ones, not the ones who simply AFKd all day in AV. It wasn't a perfect system, but I preferred it, as I have said more than once.

And by dedicated you mean "had the free time to play 24/7" or "had friends playing for them". Just being a dedicated player didn't mean shit then, because if you didn't play all day, every day, every week for months on end, there was simply no way to keep up.

That's not my opinion, either. It was a simple mathematical fact due to how they made decay and weekly ranks work.

Yeah, I was in a Skirmish with a GM and said "Gratz! You know your stuff!" She (or he) said; "nah, its just time"...meaning all you did was play a shit load to get the title. No skill needed. Now, I'm not saying all GM's have no skills, because thats not the case. But, in the BG's a person really don't need any form of skills to win or earn the GM titles

Getting the GM title meant you put off everything else in life, other than PvP in WoW. I think Neesha is trying to say it took a lot of effort (time) to earn the title, which meant something back in the day.

Neesha is old school with that EQ mindset, and people who share the same view are a dying breed indeed. Because next gen MMO's will never follow the same business model as EverQuest did. And, its a good thing if you ask me...I love how they play the "You need to earn your rewards". Yeah, this is not a job where we can get a kick ass raise for "earning" your pay. Its a game, and after its said and done, no one will care about your Epic_drop_1000000 from random high end raid zone A. Don't believe me? The next time any of us are on a date, mention it to your gal or guy. See what they have to say

I like a balance myself, but there are a lot of people who don't have the same play styles, and they have different goals too. Yet, the hardcore sit there and bitch about companies like Blizzard going for the mass market (like any company would btw, and if you were in their place, you would do the same thing too). Why don't these folks just go back to EverQuest, and be happy? Then again, EQ is nothing like it used to be I bet.

Games need to be fun for EVERYONE, not just a select few who choice to raid 24/7 for the chance of an epic item that really means nothing for the most part. Like Badge loots, Neesha. They tend to come out months after T6 content has been out. Its not like they are "the best of the best" once Blizzard added them to the game. There is nothing wrong with people grinding (and yes its a grind) to earn some nice rewards via badges. Not everyone like to raid to earn their rewards. It seems to bug you, and I don't understand why. Do you really care if n00b #100 has an item that is almost as good as BT (almost a year after the BT was released)? Or, does the epeen really matters that much to ya

If Sony released EverQuest one in todays market, it would had failed before it even began. With updated graphics and sound too. Those types of MMO's are dead now, and its time to move on. I really don't think Warhammer will keep you happy, Neesha. But, at least you're giving it a try. What happens when you are bored of RvR? Yes, its going to happen, its only a matter of time.

Quit gaying up Warhammer threads and go back and circle jerk with your WoW pvp buddies.

And in most WAR scenarios, rewards are participation based.

_________________
Marauder Harabakc Goat

So, you are saying no one will find ways around it? Riiight keep telling yourself that buddy And, I'm not defending WoW PvP at all with my statement, because people would be stupid to think Warhammer won't have its own issues and stuff

It's all a matter of preference. I prefer my efforts to be rewarded with loot (or titles or whatever else comes along). When I see people with loot as good as, or better than, the stuff I had after I worked my butt off dying and learning encounters to get that loot, I don't like it. Just like I didn't like it when I completed a long chain of quests to get a key for an area, or attunement for an area, only to have those requirements lifted (remember when they changed it in EQ and everyone could suddenly enter the Planes of Earth and Fire and Sol Ro and whatever else?). I'm not saying that I didn't take advantage when it presented itself to me, I am just saying that I don't like it on a personal accomplishment level.

The funny thing is, I am not "hardcore" I just like being rewarded for my efforts. I never finished content first and I never had a problem with that. As for the badge loot, you can say "well, they put it in late" but the fact remains that it was still put in at all. I played a Rogue, as you know, and I don't like that the best daggers in the game can be gotten simply by doing Heroic dungeons over and over again. Even today, the 2nd best Rogue pants in the game come from badges. The 4th best neck item in the entire game comes from rep that you can get in 2 weeks worth of work. The third best boots and the third best belt in the game for Rogues do not come from the third hardest boss, they come from turning in badges. You can do Karazhan 3 times (6 whole hours, 66 badges) and walk away with the 3rd best boots in the game. As someone who raids, I do not like this, and that is my prerogative. I understand the logic behind the decisions made by Blizzard (and Sony during the EQ days), but I don't have to like it.

As for what happens if I don't like Warhammer, I don't even worry about that. My life doesn't revolve around which video game makes me happiest. Games are simply an outlet and cheap entertainment.

I agree with you there. Its not cool changing it months after people worked hard for their access etc. The same thing goes for WoW too.

Oh, I did not mean games make ya happy, I meant what MMO would fit your play style better haha If Warhammer fails, what's the next game you would give a try. I was just saying, that you might never find that perfect MMO and stuff

Back to topic, since the game is coming out soon. I need to installed Windows and Dual boot to run the game But, it should be worth it tho

Participation rewards are ranked. You get a bonus to your roll by being higher on the participation list. That doesn't guarantee you the best reward, someone as low as 8th or something could possibly get it, but you get a bonus to the roll.

Khameir can explain it a lot better then I can.

If you weren't talking about WoW, then I obviously wasn't talking to you.

_________________
Marauder Harabakc Goat

That is a key element which touches other elements in developing MMO. What people forget is it takes a thought out world design to really make this happen and encourage your gameplay. I believe Everquest stumbled on this but, it wasn't that it was hard but, it was going to upper Guk or Innothule and seeing higher level players sitting outside, waiting on the list, wearing the latest thing. This made you inspect, write it down, and check Allakhazam's to find out where and how they got it. MMO's today isolate players as they graduate through levels or teirs. Thus, making players rely on screenshots instead of keeping the people in the game. In Everquest you saw people in EC tunnels, running through Beholders (FP <-> Qeynos), the Aviak Tree, needing ports, etc. continually fueling your desire to see what was beyond the horizons.

I disagree that the EQ model would fail today because I believe people are mistaken on what made EQ successful. It was their accidental preservation of community. The more they branched out from the homelands, the more it failed and lost it's luster.

You don't want main cities to lose their traffic, make everyone self-sufficient, and discourage hot spots (like EC Tunnel). I do believe the latest generation of gamer has changed. The common mistake is to think that your Jr. High - High School gamers today were like us. Time went by so fast, I think it was just yesterday but, really I started EQ when I was a Jr./Sr in High School and now i'm 27, wife, baby, and a job. I'm not the primary audience anymore.

I hope Warhammer does well. I hope it encourages community and it brings a high level of difficulty. I am a person who likes to be rewarded as well but not necessarily by the amount of time but the quality of my time. If, I work my butt off for 2 hours I think I should be rewarded as much as someone who repeats the same tedious, arguous task for 8. I believe anyone can kill a gnoll or frog for 8 hours, repeating the same process. This doesn't make an individual a better player but any standard.

Gamestop no longer gives away Beta codes for preorders and neither does Amazon. I talked to customer service reps at both companies and they said there were no more Beta codes to be handed out to anyone, from anywhere. While this may not be true, if you haven't preordered yet, I'd double-check with the place that I preordered with to make sure you were getting a beta code (assuming you wanted one).

Yah, some friends that were planning on trying it out have said that they didn't get their beta codes for pre-ordering, but some others that pre-ordered earlier got theirs.

Drat.

DAMMIT!
I'm changing jobs and gave 2 wks notice.
Since I'm going to a competitor HR wanted to boot me the same day, but my mgr fought to get me for 1 week to transition my work. That would have given me the 2nd week during open beta, paid at home and playing.

They now consider me a low risk and want me to keep working that 2nd week. If I had been a HIGH security risk I'd have had 2 weeks paid off.
WHAT THE FVCK.

By the way, you can still buy beta codes from eBay for like 15 bucks. No idea how legit it is.

Well dammit, that's kind of annoying. I didn't get in the last preview weekend beta because I was busy that weekend, now that makes for a double slap in the face =/ Oh well, at least it's only a couple days until the other beta.

I assume you mean WAR Turbo, because WoW sure as hell doesn't have that kind of equality =p



Not quite, no. WoW originally took a somewhat neutral stance, and then evolved into a more PVE-centric game because the majority of people playing demanded it. Which is perfectly understandable, and makes perfect sense for profits(WAR is a bit different of course, because they're going to try and peel off some of the disconcerted PVP folks from WoW - I don't think Mythic has any illusions about trying to beat WoW in PVE).

But you basically started out with really stale pvp in WoW with no rewards - granted some of those Tarren Mill/SS fights were kinda fun, but all in all it was an annoying form of chaos with uneven sides. Anyway, it evolved and turned into the honor system... we saw battlegrounds WSG, AV, and AB come out within a 6-month period. I believe it was then that Blizzard realized that not enough people were playing to justify sustaining that amount of content(or at least they thought that, whether it's true or not is up for debate IMO). In short, Blizzard underestimated the amount of softcore weaksauce gamers that were unable to PVP, and then focused on a PVE-centric game.

There were HUGE piles of promises during WoW beta of how CHAOTIC battles would ensue all over Azeroth, huge capital sieges! Siege weapons! I think at one point they said there would be a large focus on PVP in general. Countless beta screenshots depicted not people generically questing, but huge world PVP battles. It's understandable - look what they were originally competing with: EverQuest, with nothing but crap PVP. But at some point, the people spoke, and wanted a PVE game.

Just wanted to clarify that since it always annoys me when someone mentions that line on the WoW forums. Popular line, but not altogether accurate =p

Lots of games promise this and fail to deliver. It's why I am going to wait a while before getting WAR.

Is there any way to get into PW2 (PW+) so I can play tonight?

Otherwise I'm stuck waiting until Sun am. =(

Any dev emails I can send begging messages to?

No.