Warhammer Online recruitment bonuses to include in-game items

by Randy Nelson { Mar 9th 2009 at 4:17PM }

There's a battle of epic proportions beings waged -- for MMO memberships. EA Mythic has launched a new salvo of recruitment perks in hopes of bringing more bodies over to its side, and they go beyond the usual "refer a friend, get 30 days free" variety.

Starting today, a new tiered rewards system is rolling out for those who bring their friends into the ranks of Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning. Bring in one friend, you get the usual 30 day account credit. Another? Voila, an "exclusive in-game pet" and a month of playtime.

Refer four new players and you'll get either the "Rod of Service" or "Collar of Servitude," exclusive items that grant a 5% experience and renown bonus to all party members. After that ... just more free playtime. Though, if you stay until the very end, we hear you get a toaster.

Tags: ea, ea-mythic, electronic-arts, mythic, warhammer-online

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

THE WICKER MAN (BWF) (GT: Dalek Prime) @ Mar 9th 2009 4:58PM

Maybe your game should run on a mac w/o requiring windows. WoW had the good sense to do this, and thats why I play it.

Cal @ Mar 9th 2009 5:17PM

The WoW refer-a-friend (if it's still going) is better; 3x exp when grouped with refered player, a month free if they buy a month, an in-game pet if they buy another month. But I suppose 3x exp wouldn't work too well in a game as young as WAR (although the slow grind was what stopped me subscribing to it...)

Azbulldog @ Mar 9th 2009 5:26PM

An in-game mount, don't forget level grants, and yes it is still going.

Cal @ Mar 9th 2009 5:29PM

Ah yeah, I meant mount not pet =S And those granted levels came in very useful in the trial. Shame (or not) that even with the grind removed I couldn't get into the game, although it was after 60 and back into the real grind that I quit...

Frostybolts @ Mar 9th 2009 5:35PM

that model isn't appropriate for Warhammer Online

The reason they let you skip past most of WoW's old level 1-60 content is because there's even more content waiting for you from 60-80

Warhammer Online is a newer game, so if you skip past most of the 1-40 content you're skipping most of the game

LaughingTarget @ Mar 9th 2009 6:35PM

It also doesn't help that Blizzard outright made the 1-60 content obsolete. The items, quests, dungeons, etc are completely gimped by Burning Crusade gear. Main reason I quit, they effectively told everyone to forget about the core content and crowd into the BC expansion stuff.

As for Warhammer, the only reason there'd be a grind is if you actually felt pressured to just beat on random world spawns. Leveling goes fast in WAR just doing public quests and RvR stuff. It's the first MMO that I'll actually hit the level cap in and I've been on MMOs since, well, they were called MUDs and didn't have pretty pictures.

Anticrawl @ Mar 9th 2009 6:16PM

Now if only the aditional ingame content rewards worked. My account is all fucked up. I have so many ingame content bonus's tied to my account yet none of them work cept the stupid XP bonus book.

Jeavis @ Mar 9th 2009 6:22PM

I tried the 10 day trial and while the game is better than WoW in just about every way, in my opinion, it seems like the classes are very blurred. It's like they decided to let everyone do everything. There is no clear cut role for a certain class.

Anticrawl @ Mar 9th 2009 6:31PM

I suppose not right off the bat. They did however make it so each race has pretty much a class for any type of player because each race starts out in their own are in chapter 1. My Chosen is strictly a tank with area/self buffs/debuffs. I love the game. The RvR battles are just as fun as playing a multiplayer shooter on the 360 and public quests keep the persistant worlds from being boring.

Anticrawl @ Mar 9th 2009 6:35PM

their own area*

It's also one of those few MMO's I can stand to play alone.

LaughingTarget @ Mar 9th 2009 6:43PM

WoW is pretty much doing the same thing, though it's just driving players around to specific classes. I hear the Druid is the Jack of All Trades Master of Everything class this time around.

Though as Anticrawl said, as you get higher up, you really do have to start picking your role. I'm running a Knight of the Blazing Sun and decided to go down a more damage oriented path. I get cut down a bit faster in RvR than other tanks, mainly no shield and weak defense buffs, but I cut a large swath and have a bit more survivability than a pure damage class.

Unlike WoW, your path impacts the level your skills operate at. At level 40, if you don't go down any other paths, the skills in the other two builds are limited to level 25. A level 25 skill against a level 40 opponent is mostly worthless. Basically, once you start getting mastery points, you're not going to ever be able to do everything.

I noticed this with my brother's Warrior Priest since we've played these two characters in lock step with each other. In level 1-11, he was unstoppable but by Tier 4, the level 31-40 stuff, he's pretty much lost that edge. He went down a purely healer path to supplement my KotBS high damage output and weakened defenses and, while you can't kill him 1 on 1, he can't kill you either because his attack abilities are completely worthless.

This same dynamic works with every class in the game. Some feel unbalanced up front but once you get into the meat of the game, the T4 RvR struggle, everything is remarkably well balanced.