AoC downtime

I solved my Age of Conan crash problems by following the advice of a friend and guild mate, who insisted that I buy a sound card, because that would make my computer faster than just using onboard sound. I'm not an expert, but it appears as if my Nvidia motherboard doesn't really have a sound chip, it only emulates one using CPU power. So adding a sound card would free the CPU to do other stuff. I found a Soundblaster Audigy SE for 40 Euro, installed it, and tested that my AoC crash problem when casting a certain spell with sound on was gone.


But that was all I did in AoC last night, because then the European servers had a server maintenance downtime for 8 pm to 1 am scheduled, in preparation for the Euro launch on the 23rd. I really don't understand why all this downtime always has to be scheduled during prime time. And I've read the US early access period was even worse, because it was only 3 days, and of that time the servers were up only 48 hours, with one downtime scheduled the evening of the last day. I so hope that once the game is launched everywhere, the maintenance window is moved to mornings, local time. I find scheduled server maintenance starting at in the evening or late afternoon unacceptable for a MMO.

Source : Tobold

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Warhammer Online takes you to school with Scenarios 101

The official Warhammer Online site is a cornucopia of goodness. If you're not watching the production podcasts, Paul's video blogs are fantastic. If you're more in a text mood, there are zone previews and developer diaries to page through.

Their most recent addition to the site is over in the "special features" category, a continuation of their ongoing class in WAR: Scenarios 101. These pieces run down the rules and layout for the many and varied Realm Vs. Realm scenarios Warhammer Online will ship with. EA Mythic's answer to the WoW Battleground phenomenon, they're going to offer some of the game's meat and potatoes PvP combat over the course of a player's gameplay lifespan.

The newest 101 feature is all about the scenarios named Grovod Caverns and Reikland Hills. The caverns is a 'capture the flag'-style game, but with a twist. Flags and bases are up on a series of platforms, all connected with walkways. Every time a flag is captured, a walkway gives way; this changes the dynamic of the scenario's very surface, and forces players to adapt and change their strategies as the match progresses. Reikland, meanwhile, is a 'king of the hill'-style game that requires players to capture and hold a position for a few minutes at a time. The catch is that one of three 'hills' will be available at any given time, and the newest hill will overlap with the oldest one for some time. It's great to see how Mythic is planning to shake up some PvP assumptions with these maps. Source : massively.com

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Officers' Quarters: Jerk message of the day

Every Monday Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership.
I've spent the past six weeks talking about raiding, so I think it's time to get away from the topic and talk about something less drama-ridden, like the guild message of the day feature. What could be more straightforward and less controversial, right? Well, as this week's e-mail reminds us, no part of leading a guild is completely free of incident.
Would rather not name the guild but it's on Bronzebeard EU. Only the Guildmasters (of which there are 10) can set the message of the day. Despite this security, an offensive homophobic message of the day appeared one day. I'm afraid I didn't see it as I wasn't online while it was up, but when another Guildmaster saw it, it was immediately removed. No one owned up to it and no one could think who would do it, so one Guildmaster (a friend of mine in real life) logged a complaint with Blizzard to try and find out who set this message.
He spent a couple of weeks chasing an answer but in the end they said that who set the message was private account information that they would not give out to someone else (great cop out isn't it :) ). And there we are stuck! A couple of guildmasters left for more hardcore raiding guilds, so maybe, hopefully it was one of them . . . but I guess we'll never know. Can you think of anything that could be done to avoid this or controls to avoid this kind of offensive message?
The only way to avoid this situation is to make sure the people who have access to the GMoTD are trustworthy and responsible people. If your own officers prove that they aren't, then the guild leader can actually modify the permissions so that only he or she can change the message. But there is no built-in censorship to this feature aside from the one that sits in everyone's interface panel, and even then I don't know if the profanity filter actually affects the GMoTD.
Since you (perhaps wisely) didn't specify what the message actually read, it's difficult to judge the severity of the situation. A lot of guys who are otherwise mature adults sometimes joke around in a way that could be construed as homophobic, but typically no offense is meant. It can be good-natured smack talk, but it can also go too far and get truly offensive. Since another officer went to the trouble of contacting Blizzard about the message, I'll have to assume it's the latter.
Even though this person wasn't "caught," I'd say the officers should meet with one another and ask the offending party to step forward. Based on your e-mail, they may have already done so. However, it's entirely possible that none of the officers know who did it. If an officer's friend or roommate snuck onto the officer's machine while he or she was AFK, then that person could have changed the message with no one the wiser.
More important than who did it is how the officers respond to the situation. An apology should be made to the guild's membership. It should also be communicated that effort was taken to look into the matter, even if the results were inconclusive. If members were upset by the message, they need to know that the officers weren't passive or dismissive of the insult.
In the end, it's not necessarily a huge deal and shouldn't be made into one by extended periods of finger-pointing. Sometimes overreacting to a situation can be just as bad as not reacting at all.

Source : WoWInsider.com

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