The Advantages of Orks and Suggestions

[Sar'grath]

Much of he orkish homeland is covered by fetid and insect-haunted swamps, in which the traveller sinks ankle-deep in sticky, ubiquitous mud. Rain falls very frequently in Morak, and a combination of clouds and swamp-mist ensures that sunlight rarely - if ever - disturbs the murky ambience.

This first quote is from the Ork Racial Page, and is describing the Orkish land of Morak. The first sentence shows that there is a network of dangerous swamps that cover Morak. This gives the Orks increased cover and stealth against invaders. For transportation, our forces could be scattered across the swamps and move separately to prevent detection. The second sentence reveals that rain is very frequent in Morak and clouds block the sky. This "murky ambience" and rainfall drastically increases stealth and will prove invaluable against Human and Dwarf invasions. Here are some screenshots of the effects rain has on invisibility:

http://df.warcry.com/images/full/14912
http://df.warcry.com/images/full/14911

The northern third of Morak is dominated by a number of active volcanoes and the lava streams which issue from them. The land between these volcanoes is jagged, rocky, and as barren as the southern swamps are fecund.

This is another quote from the Ork Racial Page, confirming the well-known fact of a rigid, volcanic environment perfect for building a city. Although building on a higher elevation may be our best option, we may still want to consider this. Here are some screenshots of some lava cities:

http://df.warcry.com/images/full/21206
http://df.warcry.com/images/full/21205
http://df.warcry.com/images/full/21204

Close to Flaming Skull lie three starting villages, which is where orkish adventurers embark on their careers. New Flayed Elf is a large port community, watched over by a lighthouse and a coastal keep. Metal Heart lies on an island surrounded by deep swamp, while Chopping Necks stands on a series of interconnected pillars which rise from a lava lake.

Flaming Skull is the Orkish capital city (seen in the second and third screenshots concerning the quote above). Because there are 3 different starting villages, we should coordinate which one we start at so we all spawn together.

The orks worship the Fire Dragon, a chaos deity of awesome power, who quite recently unified the warring orkish tribes under her rule. Currently resting inside the Great Stairs in Flaming Skull, the Fire Dragon rules through Grand Messenger Arxanthos, a red dragon who receives dream-decrees from the slumbering goddess (or just claims to do so), and who commands a sinister priesthood called the Dragonbound. When the Fire Dragon is fully recuperated, she will emerge to take control over a united orkish army, and together they will unleash the Big Burning upon the world. In the meantime, the orks - who can hardly wait - do their best to prepare the ground for this rampage to end all rampages.

Here is a quote from the Ork's Lore Page. It appears as if the Fire Dragon is a sleeping goddess, and uses a mortal dragon to do her bidding. We may have to think more about the lore than we already have when taking into account this new information. Also, the Dragonbound cult may be a good name for our Darkfall Magery Division.

The traditional leader of the orkish nation is the Big Head of Flaming Skull, a sort of high king whose power over the tribes has waxed and waned through history. The current Big Head is Uzrok Deathfist, a traditionalist who resents the power of the priesthood, and who suspects that Arxanthos is faking the dream-messages from the Fire Dragon, which frequently involve bringing treasure and food to Arxanthos's lair in Emberhall.

The Big Head is apparently the leader of all Orks in Agon. We may need to take him out if we truly wish to remain powerful...

Big Head Uzrok commands one of the most active armies on Agon, and the Iron Orks are an elite group within that army, its members selected for strength, ferocity and cunning (in that order.) Utterly loyal to Uzrok, the Iron Orks answer to the Big Head directly, and some speculate that building their strength is the gambit in a scheme to wrest power from the Dragonbound.

The Iron Orks may be a good name for my tribe, or a rank within a tribe. Fits the lore too!

The Dragonbound are an extremely powerful group of fundamentalists, who have dedicated their lives to the Fire Dragon, and who show their loyalty by cutting off their lips and covering their bodies in self-inflicted scars. The Dragonbound are not averse to working behind the back of Big Head Uzrok, who they see as a mere pawn (and an insolent one, at that) in the Fire Dragon's game.

To continue on the Dragonbound comment above, here we have a more indepth discussion of the cult. This looks perfect for *our* clan and lore.

The Guild of Thugs is a highly organized - by orkish standards - outlaw band, who seek to reduce Morak to a state of anarchy, so that they can enjoy free rein. The Guild undermines the rule of the Big Head whenever they can, and they despise the Dragonbound priesthood.

A group of Orkish bandits. Always a possibility.

The orks throw all their weak or sickly children into the swamp. As a result of this process of evolution through orkish selection, the inhabitants of Morak are physically stronger than most other races on Agon. Orks also have a natural aptitude for melee combat and for other skills that involve brute force.

The orkish mount is an enormous, vile-tempered beast called the death pig. This monstrosity sweats constantly and profusely, covering its black, hairless hide in a glistening layer of oily liquid. In combat, the Death Pig kicks with powerful hooves and slashes with large, curved tusks which protrude from the sides of their mouths. Orkish smiths strengthen these natural weapons with a thin coat of leenspar, which is then decorated with black orkish runes. The eyes of the Death Pig are tiny red sparks of malevolence which almost disappear in the thick folds of their leathery foreheads.

Orks see most other races as little more than sources of income, sadistic fun and sacrificial victims. The only other race that the orks can comfortably form clans with are the mahirim, who they respect for their bravery, cunning and skill in battle.

And this is why we are Orks.

This is all for right now. I'll get more soon.

[Sar'grath]

Continued from post 1...

Everything in Darkfall has been optimized for speed since it has been made for massive warfare. To give you an idea, you could get good gameplay displaying graphics like our latest screenshots using an average - above average system and a Geforce 6600 graphics card. The graphics are very scalable, with the difference that you won't look at the screenshot graphics, and your own scaled-down graphics will look like crap in comparison. I see official screenshots from other games that look amazing, then I see some in-game screens and they're an insult. We don't have a 'screenshot setting only' to sell you the game - all of Darkfall's graphics settings are fully useable. Furthermore, the Darkfall engine can be set to auto-scale real-time to maintain your desired framerate. Our number one priority is gameplay, and this is why the graphics have just recently started coming along in a big way. Having said that, the screenshots and videos still do not do the live game justice...your game screen will look far better than anything we've shown you so far.

This tells us that the best screenshots that we see are horrible in comparison to the actual game. You can set the graphic settings to change so you can reach a desired framerate, an essential feature in such a game. Found in Dev Journal 24.

From the ones we know about, It's at least more than twice the land area size of the largest announced or released MMO out there. This world is also seamless and zoneless. You won't see people popping up everywhere, or camping your zone drop. We feel that this is crucial for a PvP game. To run from one end to another at regular running speed could take more than 8 hours. This is just an estimate: It could take less or more time depending on your route. It's not the exact size of the world which is that important though, it's what's in it. We could conceivably make an endless barren world but what's the point of that? In Darkfall our world is full of content, we keep adding more every day and it's all usable: Movement is not restricted, you don't have to stick to road travel, there are no invisible walls, no impassable mountains. Furthermore, you can go to places we didn't necessarily mean for you to go to by running, swimming, diving, climbing, using ladders, elevators, get blasted up, boosted up...any way you can get there, we've placed no restrictions. The scale of the Darkfall world is closer to realism than any other MMO we've seen. In Darkfall snowcaps are earned. This effectively multiplies the size of the world in a much bigger way than in most scaled down MMO worlds.

HUGE world. Absolutely gigantic. On top of that, you can climb, run, jump, swim, dive, and much more to get around the world. There are NO INVISIBLE WALLS WHATSOEVER! There are also NO ZONES. There is no mountain that is IMPASSABLE! I would say this is fake if I already didn't know better.

Someone asked for a description of a typical PvP and a PvE encounter: To this I'll answer that there is no typical encounter in Darkfall. There are too many variables and you never know what you're getting into. Here's a quick PvE encounter for you nevertheless:

You ride up to a seemingly abandoned village and you get off your mount to explore it. As you enter through a gate, you hear a sound just as a mob jumps on you from above and connects with its weapon. You back up trying to mess up its range while you pull out your battleaxe. You rush the mob which circle-strafes you and you miss in your initial attacks. You manage to trade a couple of blows with it and it turns and runs. You pull out your bow and you notice it's doing the same as it's running off. You aim for its back and right as you release, your aim is thrown off by the explosion of a fireball which knocks you back and you miss. By the time you recover, the initial mob starts landing arrows on you and its friends are shooting spells while a couple are closing in to engage you with melee weapons. You run to your mount under fire and you try to get away but it gets killed from under you and you have to run away zigzagging because your character is in bad shape. Just as you think you're safe, an arrow, fired by another player you haven't seen in all the commotion, finishes you off and you're summarily stripped of your belongings. The End.

Judge for yourself.

There are 44 unique massive clan city sites like that one in Darkfall and 53 unique clan villages and hamlets.

Therefore, we need to get one of those 44 massive clan city sites. WE NEED ONE!!!!

They've hacked in the PvP but that doesn't even come close to offering freedom, so they have to sell the byproducts of PvP. We never tried to exploit the M rating, and we never felt there was a need to tease our players with promises of ultra violence or sexist sexual innuendo. For us, it's all about the features that come from offering full freedom gameplay with accountability. We've remained true to our original vision to this day.

Crack at Age of Conan. Genius.

As a result Darkfall is more action packed than anything out there and this is supported by its features as well as by the lack of gameplay restrictive features: no target selection, aimed attacks, full physics, no radar, no floating names, no floating damage, no fuchsia, or chartreuse colored circles at your feet, no invisibility, 'true stealth', visual and audio cues, full mounted combat, naval combat etc.

Confirming what we already knew and loved.

You won't be buried under tomes of lore just to know what you're doing in the world. The players in Darkfall start fresh and will ultimately write their own stories and shape the world. In Darkfall the lore supports the gameplay, and not the other way around. There will be many of you that never read a single line of lore in this or any other game they play. In this game, this won't hold you back.

You don't get gameplay based off the lore, you get lore based off of the gameplay. We write our own lore starting at the year 0. How awesome is that?

That's it for right now. May have some more if I find more.

[Ugg]

great post..
good breakdown of advantages.
look forward to conquering agon with the bloodclan