WH making same mistake as WOW?

Kyleran

So I took a look at the recent screenshots of the Empire races yesterday and I noticed one big difference with the Dwarves/Greenskins.  The Empire has all of the "pretty" characters.  By and large all of the characters on the other side would be considered "ugly" by many players of this game.

One big problem that WOW struggles with is an imbalance between sides, with horde almost always being on the short end of the stick.  This is generally attributed as being due to the fact that Alliance characters are better looking, and the Alliance is considered to be the "good" side. (Hence BC's addition of Blood Elves)

I see people making the same analogies/mistakes in WH as well. Women are notorius for not wanting to play ugly characters, (as well as some men of course) and way too many people want to play for the "good" side.

In DAOC you had 3 factions, and generally when one faction got too strong (was Albs in the early days) the other two sides would gang up on them (in RvR) and could survive.

Since much of WH's combat is in the open world, and not in controlled areanas, the Empire could easily end up outnumbering the other side in most fights and zerging them to death.  This has a cascading effect. People like to play for the winning side in a zerg... so they re-roll and play on easy mode.

Yes, I know, the hardcore WH fan, serious roleplayer, or skilled PvP'er isnt' going base his side selection on such shallow critiera...but for the game to succeed (financially) it needs to draw in the more causal gamer and I fear these folks may really screw with the balance.

What I'd like to see is each side get a cap put on them for each side... making up a number...limit it to 1000 Empire and 1000 Dwarf's/Greenskins (sorry, dont' know their faction designation).  At least in the RvR areas of the game. (unless of course, every area is RvR)

Maybe this has already been addressed by WH somehow, I'm not well schooled on the games development. Anyone know if my concerns are well founded or totally off base?

checkthis500

I wouldn't consider the empire to have all of the "pretty" characters. In fact people were complaining that the empire females were too "butch" and "ugly" on a thread on warhammeralliance.  Also they were complaining that the dwarf females were going to be ugly. Here's a response from Adam Gershowitz, the lead character artist.

"*Chuckles*

How bout we entertain the thought for just a moment that there will be ugly, and attractive characters. As well as Homely, Plump, Waifish, Sexy, Alluring, Disgusting, scarred, Old, young, etc etc etc.

Not everyone needs to look like a 22 year old porn star, with implants. Even if 75% of the male player base would prefer it that way.

Yeah it's a little unfortunate that our first two female glances were of a Dwarf, and of one of the more Matronly sisters. But honestly for those of you that want "Hot" those needs will be fufilled as well, and we'll prove that in the coming months. But remember making an intresting game world takes all types. You might not choose the less attractive options for yourself. But that dosn't mean they don't have a good use in the game world.

I mean what exactly would you expect a battle hardened 30+ year old sister superior to look like? Also I rather like the dwarves actually reflecting what a short stout woman would look like, rather then say the Lineage 2 Old dirty pedifiles & pigtailed female children syndrome.

-G

P.S. I find it funny that last month I got to read thread after thread of how we shouldn't make all our females sex symbols. Now I can watch the complete polar oppisite thread develop."

I think the characters in WAR are looking great.  The warrior priest female while not having "sex appeal" and being half naked looks attractive, but she looks badass at the same time.  I think they're hitting a nice balance and the characters so far are very resemblent of the miniatures as well as the lore.

fansede

Don't forget to add Dark Elves, High Elves and Chaos in your Poll. Or revise your Poll to be Order or Destruction.

From what I have been reading I think the Order forces will be outnumbered at the beginning at least. I see High Elves usually are polling last in races that will be played.

Most people like being bad guys at first. I myself look to see what is the least desired and try to fill that niche. Prolly gonna play High Elf healer or something of that nature/role.

I thought I remember something in the forums about population bonuses and such in WAR. I do remember in DAOC that when population levels were low in a certain race, the experience bonuses would be granted to help things.

That being said, I cannot find the link to back it up, so torch my behind for being a fool.

Xantheous

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Originally posted by Kyleran
One big problem that WOW struggles with is an imbalance between sides, with horde almost always being on the short end of the stick.  This is generally attributed as being due to the fact that Alliance characters are better looking, and the Alliance is considered to be the "good" side. (Hence BC's addition of Blood Elves)

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 You might want to re-look at your Warcraft lore guide book as Alliance is acually what you would refer to as the "bad guys" bent on world domination. This is an argument that "A LOT" of WoW people have had in the past but if you have played all the games and taken the time to read the history you would find that my opinion is in the majority.

Leonatos65

Personally, I'm quite glad they're not making the characters "pretty" and all fashioned to a particular physique. I get upset when gamers develop character models just for the sake of the idealistic knight in shining armor with the awesome hair, cool scar on his face, and sexiest man of the year body. Yeah these are some points and more we all want to see in our character because we want others to stop, look, and "Oooh-Aaah" our avatar.

Lets face it though, Dwarves aren't meant to look pretty and I'm sure their women shouldn't either. Greenskins in this game are what I love about Orcs. They're brutal, huge, dumb, and absolutely savage. The Orcs in WoW do the whole "fight for survival and honor" crap but cmon, who wants that nonsense when we think of ORCS!

High Elves and Dark Elves will in essence play the whole attractive agenda for those gamers out there who want the hot avatar wielding the bow and sword. Elves, no matter what lore they're in, are always portrayed as the gentler faced wise community but we'll see in Warhammer the arrogance of the High Elves and the ferocity of the Dark Elves.

Unfortunately for those who will pick this game up without knowing a thing at all about Warhammer will pick the race which to them looks the coolest and not the true motivation behind their actions. Thanks to WoW, stereotypes will  be played into every MMO now. I know Warhammer will change all that!

Oh change your poll because it doesn't make any sense. There are only two Factions (Order and Destruction) and 6 races (O: Empire, Dwarves, High Elves...D: Chaos, Dark Elves, Orcs/Goblins) which can each be counted as separate since we'll be able to fight anyone of the opposing faction (ie, Chaos Warriors can march over and whip some bloody High Elf ass). Thanks for your time!

logangregor

I disagree with the premise that WoW is unbalanced because people think one side looks prettier than the other. First off, alot of people like playing the bad guys. Secondly, WoW is unbalanced because the leet pve gear is overpowered in pvp, not because more people play attractive races.

One other thing you said I think your way off base with

"Since much of WH's combat is in the open world, and not in controlled areanas, the Empire could easily end up outnumbering the other side in most fights and zerging them to death. This has a cascading effect. People like to play for the winning side in a zerg... so they re-roll and play on easy mode. "

Much of the battlegrounds for lack of a better word, are instanced.
There will be no way for one side to have FAR more people than the other.

callmetoby

I actually found the opposite to be true in WoW.  On both my alliance server and my horde server, the horde seemed to have the higher general population as well as a greater amount of hardcore players.  For true fans of a game, I really think whether your character is "attractive" or not has very little to do with their character selection.  I get more excited about racial traits and class abilities than anything when I roll a new toon.  And if my character is ugly...that's why god made helmets.

Volkmar

first of all, tell me what is "cute" in this character: http://www.warhammeronline.com/newsletter/images/2006/CA_oct_2006_newsl19.jpg

Second, please, do some research before posting thanks.

WAR sides are pretty well balanced. We have 2 elves and 2 human races plus 2 "ugly" races.

Each side get 1 elf, 1 human and 1 ugly race. Dark and High elves are physically very simlar, with dark elf females being much less clothed than high elves ones usually, Chaos humans are classical nordic scandinavian guys and if you ever been there you know the % of good looking woman is astonishing, so imagine the chaos women will be tall, blonde and very shapely. plus they are evil, so prefer leather and S&M stuff maybe, adding to the allure .

The ugly races are orcs and dwarves, appealing for other reasons than looks.

So, to me it seems we are pretty well set after all.

 

Distortion0

I think you are severly misinformed, Mythic knows the exact problem you describe and has taken steps to fix it. I don't know what you think the sides are but it's Order vrs Chaos. That's devided into three parings: Empire vrs The Chaos Hoarde, Dwarves vrs Orcs and High Elves vrs Dark Elves. See, they pinned the ugly races against each other, they pinned the human looking races against each other and they pinned the pretty races against each other, just to solve the problem you are worried about. You ought to look into the game more.

callmetoby

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Originally posted by Volkmar

first of all, tell me what is "cute" in this character: http://www.warhammeronline.com/newsletter/images/2006/CA_oct_2006_newsl19.jpg

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You don't think he's cutesy?  The barbershop quartet moustache, the flame-scarred corneas, the nicely sharpened fingernails that he no doubt had polished during his manicure just before his photo shoot...I think he's adorable.

He reminds me of this friend I had back when I was a teenager (whom I really want in no way to be associated with anymore for soon-to-be obvious reasons) who thought it would be a good idea to light a trail of gunpowder and watch it blow up when it got to the end.  He figured Yosemite Sam did it so it must be a great idea.  So he and his sidekick laid this long line of gunpowder that ended in a huge pile about 20 feet away.  They tried repeatedly to light the trail and it just fizzled.  So my friend (we'll call him Tim...since that's his name) says "This is never gonna work, lets just light the pile".  So over he went, match in hand, and lit the pile.  His friend told me there was this instant flash, and when he turned around, Tim's face was stuck in an expression fairly similar to that of the wizard in that pic.  Except his eyebrows and eyelashes were gone.  I saw him the following day and had a good laugh at his expense.  He kept his mouth open for the next couple of days because he said it hurt to close it.  I only wish I'd been there to see it all firsthand.

So yeah, that's what the Bright Wizard makes me think of...what my friend would look like today had he kept up his Looney Toons fascination.  Definately not an attractive man.

checkthis500

It's interesting to me that in most games you're always like "Wow that character looks badass, I wish I could look like him." 

And in WAR I get the feeling that the NPC's are going to be saying that about the PCs.  Considering the NPC shots of the bandits compared to the warrior priests and bright wizards.

Uglek

If I have a choice I will play the "bad guys" in any MMORPG I can.  I started as a troll in EQ and currently play a orc in WoW.  In WAR I will play a orc because I enjoy the enviorment of my brutish friends.  Rather see WAR stick to its guns then prety up the "bad guys" to get more players on that side.

havocthefirs

    I've been playing online games since they first came out starting with UO and I never saw a girl with an ugly character in any game. Women will always play the best looking characters.

sjona

you might aswell ask why people want to choose order over destruction, instead of the almost generalizations of the entire humanity
no offense OP, but you make it sound like everyone tend to choose good guys.

strangely i have seen the ratio being chaos:empire 4:1 in guilds and almost also in the population ^^

so i dont belive its entirely true that it is good guys "everyone" like, but actually the "cool-looking" fellas.

in WoW, most of the gear(which the game is based around, ONLY) didnt really fit any horde character decently, except the small undead peeps, so i dont think people took good sides because of the fact that it sounded good - in WC noone are actually the good guys - rather they took them because of the looks.

Vampires

Well for starters, in the warhammer world good is NOT winning!!! Evil is, Dwarf's are stuck in their hills, constantly under attack by both orc's and skaven. Empire are constantly at war with Chaos. If you read the War hammer lore, which there is quite a bit of lore considering it has been around for 25 YEARS!!! (WOW has not even seen half that time.) You would know that Evil rules the day there not good! I don't think it matters if one race is pretty or not. Yes people like to play the good side but in this game they may be makin a grave mistake!!

Houndshead

sorry im new the forum and have decided to start hanging her from now (forum trolling ftw!) i havnt bothered reading all that have been said on this thread just the 2-3 first replays x-D anyway here are my 2 cents

i dont want alot of 22year old pr0n star in the game becuse its so god damn stupid. sure make em cute but dont make em god damn cheerleaders.. unluckly for me i do belive that when Dark Elves and High Elves are reveled we will get just that. from Warhammer lore Humans, Dwarves, Chaos and Greenskins arent even moderate "sexy" by todays standard as in the warhammer world the dont got all the makeup and usaly have a hard time while growing up (im talking shit aint i !?) however all the Elves in the warhammer world are concidered very hot by Humans.

i totaly love the concept art of the humans and are 100% pleased.. BTW ALLIANCE CHARS LOOK BETTER THEN HORDE !? WTF ARE YOU ATOTAL FUCK FACE

FOR THE HORDE!!!!!!
(xWoW player.. horde to the end)

callmetoby

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Originally posted by Houndshead

i dont want alot of 22year old pr0n star in the game becuse its so god damn stupid. sure make em cute but dont make em god damn cheerleaders.. unluckly for me i do belive that when Dark Elves and High Elves are reveled we will get just that. from Warhammer lore Humans, Dwarves, Chaos and Greenskins arent even moderate "sexy" by todays standard as in the warhammer world the dont got all the makeup and usaly have a hard time while growing up (im talking shit aint i !?) however all the Elves in the warhammer world are concidered very hot by Humans.

i totaly love the concept art of the humans and are 100% pleased.. BTW ALLIANCE CHARS LOOK BETTER THEN HORDE !? WTF ARE YOU ATOTAL FUCK FACE

FOR THE HORDE!!!!!!
(xWoW player.. horde to the end)

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I'm still chuckling...welcome to the boards.

Murais

   The OP is more than a little mis-informed.

    First of all, Empire characters are quite a bit far from cute. They're a struggling, plague stricken race constantly being threatened by being completely over-run by corruption.

   Secondly, dwarves and greenskins are not on the same faction. So that means so far, it's one ugly race for Order, and one ugly race for Destruction. It's even so far.

    If you want sexy porn-star look, play an elf. If you want to play a serious warrior-character, play dwarf or greenskin. And if you want something a little in between, play Empire or Chaos. Simple as that.

callmetoby

It really makes me laugh to see how many people are taking this thread seriously.  Especially when the subject of it is based on something that is completely relative. 

"Empire is too cute!"  "Huh uh, Empire looks hardcore! Greenskins dont' look evil enough" "Why would you play something so ugly?  I want want to be a pretty lady!" "If you knew anything about the lore at all you would know that Warhammer is anti-pretty lady, go skip through the fields with the butterflies you carebear" "You're all wrong, they all look like pussies, this game will never survive unless everyone looks like a burn victim!"

What's "cute", ugly, looks "badass" or (insert adjective here) is different with everyone.  Some people, like myself, think subtleties are enough to graphically express what denotes a good or an evil character.  Others think that if you don't have a hideous mutation bulging out the side of your neck, you look too nice and couldn't possibly be evil enough for their taste.  I honestly don't care whether my character looks like a ladies' man or looks like he's been kicked in the face by a mule.  Is that going to effect my character's gameplay at all or the amount of enjoyment I get out of RvR?  I doubt it. 

In response to this thread's topic being about the "mistake".  What mistake?  There is no mistake.  What is a flaw to one person is a strong point to another.  Take DAOC, for example, when Catacombs brought in the new graphics engine.  A lot of people loved the change.  On the other hand a lot of others complained that their character, or other characters, were now ugly so they played with the older graphic settings for those races.  Does that mean it was a mistake for Mythic to upgrade their game?  No, it means everyone has a different idea of what looks good.  In closing; Less pointless talk about what's too cute or too ugly...more talk about things that actually matter. 

And if everyone liked the same thing, they'd play the same side.  And wouldn't that make for some fun PvP.

Joliust

This thread makes me Lolergiggle. OP is wrong, everyone else is write, end of story.

WendoXXX

Zomg.... what kind of moron poll is that?

And ye, they should change the entire lore of the game so some 13  year old can tuch himself after typing  /dance

Kyleran

Whew... tough crowd.... guess this sentence got overlooked...

"Maybe this has already been addressed by WH somehow, I'm not well schooled on the games development. Anyone know if my concerns are well founded or totally off base?"

I was merely making conversation in a forum, but apparently got leapt on by a bunch of fanboi's who have spent every waking minute learning the WH lore and who fell all over each other in an attempt to display their superior knowledge of the game while mocking another.

I was really concerned with the fact that so far, several of the games I've played including DAOC and Warcraft have had serious problems in keeping the number of people balanced between the factions.  Despite what one person said... its a known fact that Alliance greatly outnumber the horde on 9/10 servers.   And in DAOC Albion/Hiberia almost always had more people that the Midgard realms.

I was just wondering if steps were being taken to encourage a better balance.  I thank those people who took the time to correct the mistakes in my post and provide accurate information about the games character development.  The rest of you can go back and play with your minatures..... 

I will apologize for making a mis-informed post/poll, (but hell, 25 people responded to it) and it might have been more helpful of one of the Know-it-alls on the forum had gone ahead and posted one that was more accurate. But no... I guess being an arse is more fun.

checkthis500

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Originally posted by Kyleran
Whew... tough crowd.... guess this sentence got overlooked... "Maybe this has already been addressed by WH somehow, I'm not well schooled on the games development. Anyone know if my concerns are well founded or totally off base?" I was merely making conversation in a forum, but apparently got leapt on by a bunch of fanboi's who have spent every waking minute learning the WH lore and who fell all over each other in an attempt to display their superior knowledge of the game while mocking another. I was really concerned with the fact that so far, several of the games I've played including DAOC and Warcraft have had serious problems in keeping the number of people balanced between the factions.  Despite what one person said... its a known fact that Alliance greatly outnumber the horde on 9/10 servers.   And in DAOC Albion/Hiberia almost always had more people that the Midgard realms. I was just wondering if steps were being taken to encourage a better balance.  I thank those people who took the time to correct the mistakes in my post and provide accurate information about the games character development.  The rest of you can go back and play with your minatures.....  I will apologize for making a mis-informed post/poll, (but hell, 25 people responded to it) and it might have been more helpful of one of the Know-it-alls on the forum had gone ahead and posted one that was more accurate. But no... I guess being an arse is more fun.

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You have to understand that a lot of people that have been following WAR are a little jumpy when it comes to anything that has the words "like WoW" in it.

It's just because if you scroll through the forum topics, there are a lot of WAR vs. WoW topics, and it's tough to get over that in your thread topic.  Had you named it something like
"Will 'pretty' classes/races cause imbalance in WAR?"

then it would probably have been met with open arms, and you could have used WoW as the basis of your argument, but directly comparing them in the thread title makes people get ready to go troll slaying.

To answer your Original Post in a more succinct way.  I think that going by the quote I put up from Gersh in the second post of this thread, they're going for a balance of looks so that you get a little of everything, kind of like real life.  I for one am a fan of this, and I think it is pretty much the most balanced looking game cosmetically that I've seen so far.

This is me assuming things based on what I'm expecting the dark elves and elves to look like. 

This wasn't a bad discussion to have, I just think you could have brought it about without titling it as you did. 

Just some advice for future threads.  If it has WoW in the title and it's on the WAR forums, it's going to be met with goblin fanatics and troll slayers.

Brainy

The OP is correct is saying that previous MMO's have had this exact problem.   WoW has documented facts showing Alliance has far outnumbered Horde since the very beginning.  To try to say it was caused by one side having better pve equipment is totally false.  Alliance has outnumbered horde at least by 2v1 on most servers, and 5v1 on many servers since the 1st day.  Way before anyone even had any clue about end game equipment.  In addition some Horde races actually have better racial traits like "undead" yet that hasnt solved the problem at all.

But forget wow, look no further then Mythics own DAOC: Alb, Hib, Mid.  In the first year of the game Alb seriously outnumbered all realms, Mid has always had less people on most realms.  I remembered on Lancelot when Alb used to camp emain with 10x more players then both realms combined.  Obvious problem and has never been corrected actually, Midgard still suffers from lack of players.  It might be pawned off as one realm better then another which may or may not be true.  But you cant use that excuse when the game first came out and people joined one realm over another without any knowledge of the game at all. 

milamber12

;p love the qoute brother i couldnt agree with what he said more.  i cant stand all the prepubesant kids that need to be looking at some huge breasted female to play a mmo.  I wish a game would make it more realistic and actually have the people we play more like what a person that is involved in war would look like. 

zakion

Bit of a late responce to this but i think.....

the issue WoW had was that each side was identical in terms of characters apart from there skin. ok u can argue the racial abilities but tbh they werent really a major decider, so when it came to picking sides i can see why people picked the more "prettier" races. With WAR however each class is unique so even if some are all flowery and pretty, it wont make people choose them cause they may not have the class they want. i think that it could be the complete opposite. Not cause everyone wants to be the bad guys but more for the fact the good guys are almost generic to most rpg eg, warrior priest = true paladin not ur fake WoW paladin tho, Bright wizard ur generic wizard however what rpg has Squig hearders???? ok they are a hunter like class but a multi pet hunter, first time i think its been done in an mmo setting,so i think that looks will play very little influence in this game and ppl will choose there favorite races that they always play or some unique class new on the scene......

 

i think.......