Destruction's dominance is temporary, says Mythic's Drescher
by Michael Zenke 
Sep 24th 2008 at 9:45AM
Filed under: Fantasy, Podcasts, Culture, Warhammer Online, Massively highlights
Josh Drescher: There's something about the kind of person who likes to Beta test MMOs that draws them towards the badguys. All throughout Beta we saw a disproportionate popularity on the Destruction side. We know from previous games we've worked on, the good guys tend to be significantly more popular. Everyone wants to save the princess and have shiny armor. Even though we don't offer any princess saving in our game, we knew that the good guys were going to wind up generally more popular in the long term.
What we're seeing now is that people looked at server populations on launch day and made a choice. "Oh, I've heard bad guys are really popular, I want to be on the side that's most popular." They chose Destruction characters initially.
Dan Enright: Actually, a lot of people have been going in and choosing Order deliberately. Whether they saw the shorter queues or knew they'd have more opportunity to participate in Scenarios, or they just wanted an increased challenge ... we're seeing a lot of people move to Order.
Be sure to check out the full interview in Massively Speaking Episode 24!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Buckshot said on 9:56AM 9-24-2008
Destruction ftw! Love me some greenskins!
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MightyIdle said on 10:09AM 9-24-2008
Dwarfs are sexy.
Origosis said on 10:22AM 9-24-2008
*sniff* I do really good in scenarios with my Bright Wizard, but order usually looses 4/5 times and with a NASTY point spread of 300 - 400 points in favor of destruction.
The leve spread is horrible too. order will have a few 1's, 2's 3's 4's all the way to a 10 and an 11 while destruction will have 4 10's and 3 11's and will have about a 150 point lead in the first 60 seconds. This only makes the final XP and Renown bonus smaller. With my Bright Wizard and Witch Hunter I was able to get ALOT of XP and Renown, but it still sucks loosing a scenario and only getting 800xp/40 renown when i could get 6000xp/300 renown
still even with order loosing most of the scenarios there is some kind of balance in place. maybe cause destruction has 5/1 lead over us in numbers they have to win 4/5 games to break even? it makes sense cause right now despite only winning 3/14 scenarios last night order still holds the zone control
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Origosis said on 10:27AM 9-24-2008
Oh also I must mention it is in Tier 1 that I experience these HEavy Looses My Higher level Witch Hunter in Tier 2 has not seen order loose a scenario YET! then again this could just be luck.
Hot$auce_Magik said on 10:33AM 9-24-2008
WAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!!!!!!!!
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Eldritch said on 10:56AM 9-24-2008
Problem ist - no "knight in shining armor" class present atm, only elfs with stupid helmets and small round armored barrels named Ironbreaker
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censorman said on 11:37AM 9-24-2008
Sadly, there are a lot of 'good boi' alliance nubs among Destruction at the moment. Hope we trim off the weak, shouldn't be winning 4/5, should be 5/5.
That single loss is cause of the doodz who play chics (or BEs) rolling Destruction.
...but honestly, Destruction vs. Order seems to be dependent on the time of day in Wolfenburg. During the day Order mow us down in BGs. At night, we roll them.
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toxin said on 2:09PM 9-24-2008
All of the destruction toons look badass. All of the order toons look stupid. You decide.
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barth said on 2:50PM 9-25-2008
It didn't help things that nearly all the marketing was surrounding greenskins and their irritating style of speech... every podcast had what's his name ranting about how much he hated Elves, and all the people who think that rolling Destruction is going to guarantee they won't face the same fate in PVP that they did as Alliance.
Plus the order models look terrible. Even the supposedly good looking elves' face models look like they are all mentally handicapped. The tanks wear dresses? Empire looks decent, but they have the insane looking bright wizards and just plain corny witch hunters. Everything is cooler about Destruction, yet they think things will balance out?
Reader said on 1:27PM 9-24-2008
"Actually, a lot of people have been going in and choosing Order deliberately. Whether they saw the shorter queues or knew they'd have more opportunity to participate in Scenarios, or they just wanted an increased challenge ... we're seeing a lot of people move to Order."
I originally wanted to play a Disciple of Khaine really bad, but I went Warrior Priest for this reason. Someday when the pop levels out maybe I'll make some destro characters.
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Jess said on 2:26PM 9-24-2008
I play Empire/Order because I play Empire in REAL Warhammer. I realize though that I am in the minority.
The days of "Everyone wants to save the princess and have shiny armor." are fast fading. Drescher needs to look at the world around him (including his own country where there is a homicide every 30 mins) and realize that if so many people are evil in real life, where they will actually face real life consequnces, then the numbers will be tenfold in virtual world where there is no consequence for being the bad guy.
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Reader said on 10:12PM 9-24-2008
My understanding is that there isn't really a good side in Warhammer... Empire is just less evil than the other. They are like the old tyrant ran states of our history, ruthlessly executing people for untried crimes, burning witches, mass murder, etc.
Earnest Dodge said on 11:30PM 9-24-2008
Mythic needs to come to terms with the fact that they made one side really really cool and one side kinda lame and dorky. And this issue is so central to the game, that if they don't do something soon, I'm afraid the game will be ruined. Make changes now before Order starts rerolling Destruction en masse!
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Brian! said on 1:51AM 9-25-2008
Hey there Michael... another article on how Order will, someday, out number Destruction. Why is it that everyone keeps thinking that the general computer gamer wants to play the "good guy"?
Here are some VERY simple reasons why WAR players turn to destruction:
#1 - THE BIGGEST REASON - Nearly every bit of Warhammer marketing features Destruction. Further, the media also chooses to utilize pictures enhancing the allure of Destruction. Case in point, lets look at the picture you used for this news bit. Huge massive orc up against a single, small dwarf. From this picture... who is going to win? Do you want to be the dwarf fighting against the odds or the massive orc about to kill the small stuntie? In a PvP game, people tend to choose the winning side.
#2 - World of Warcraft is the popular MMO right? Well, we ALL know that in PvP Horde owns Alliance on average. Sure, this have changed over time, but for the majority of WoW's existance, Horde won the battlegrounds. So, well... you have a LOT of players trained that the winning side is the destruction side, especially all the players who lost bad as Alliance and what their time in the sun. Those are probably those heroes your hoping will go Order soon.
#3 - Mythic have some favoritism to Destruction. If you get the collector edition, do you get an Order miniature? No you get an Orc. After playing both sides, it also feels as though the Destruction side of the quests are slightly more polished. Just slightly.
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Buckeye said on 7:39AM 9-25-2008
It's not like Mythic couldn't have seen this comming a mile away as the imbalance was quite evident in beta. Now that the game is live it's even more pronounced.
I haven't seem this much zerging since I played on Lancelot in DAoC. It appears Destruction is the new Albion.
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