Hoo boy! Last night was an EPIC battle in the streets of Altdorf! TWICE! Thank you 1.3.2 for the performance improvements, helluva nice job done there. I went from averaging a slideshow of sub-epic proportions to about 15-20fps. Of course, once I realized that I had my game set to Highest Quality I manage to squeeze out another 15fps on top of that =D. A few niggles here and there to work out, but all in all this patch is definitely the smoothest implementation to date!

The night started out buggering around with my UI, a little pissy that my Backpack wasn’t working (but you can find a fix for that right here). Ran a couple scenarios and ended up getting rolled back to back, of course, my Slayer had all his points refunded. Ha, no tactics, handful of abilities missing… Yeah, slight oversight there. I went back and specced him out again. I little miffed that my Doomseeker was moved to a Morale 4 and got replaced with Deadly Determination (albeit now at 300 damage per hit for 8 attacks). All set and ready I ran back out for a few more scenarios with my usual parry/disrupt build at 30/18% each, loaded up on a spirit resist pot, and my corp resist tactic, only to find a melee train chewing on me face =O. Ah well, this is why I use ClosetGoblin after all. Quickly switching tactics and gear makes for a game changer! Back to my standard 40% parry, 4500 armor, and Riposte tactic. Things went a little smoother but I just wasn’t dishing out nearly as much damage as I was hoping for. The new M2 was NOTHING compared to the awesome that Doomseeker used to be…

It didn’t take much longer than that for Altdorf to become sieged the first time. Off I went! Finding a pug-band didn’t take long and the initial siege was under way! The puggers didn’t do half bad, unfortunately I was the bad one. It made me feel bad. Possibly because the narrow corridors of Altdorf left tons of opportunity for AoE spellcasting of doom and I couldn’t get close enough to unleash my own fury, also perhaps because I built a new UI and was having a hell of a time adjusting to it. Once I found the fix to my backpack bug I did a little better. Without a healer and no guard, I was just meat for the grinder. Still, we defended succesfully, snagged a handful of invader crests, and went on my way.

After finishing up with that, I ran my Archmage though a couple scenarios and actually had a much better time. Of course, whenever I run my healer, there’s always a half dozen other healers, but that’s what Murphy’s Law is all about I guess. Kiting Witch Elves and slowly draining the life out of Chosen was more fun than usual. Stagger makes it much easier for squishes to get the hell out of the way I think. Eventually I had a group ask me to do a Helm run (I already had it, but hey, why not?). Uneventful, simple, easy. Helm has got to be the easiest one to do by far. Except when you get two of the same helmet drop for a class that isn’t there. Thank you Magical Salvaging. I’ll take those. Nice, r200 purple wounds frag ftw. One of the guys on the run was playing an alt, and asked me if I wanted to come to Vulture Lord to take a crack at boss #7. He knew I had a rather angry Slayer that could DPS with the best of em….

Naturally, I couldn’t refuse. I specced back out of Skaven and into a great-weapon build something like This, using a Scalebreaker Waraxe. I’ve tried going the big hitter great weapon style before, and it just never really suited me. I didn’t feel like I did enough damage, but for single bosses, that’s what would work best. So we get to VL, do the PQ outside, clear the trash up to boss #7 where this group had left off, pull out a standard, pot up, go over the strat, and BAM! Server crashes. Ah well, at least it was considerate enough to do it before we got halfway through the fight. That could have been a lot more frustrating. I expect things like this to happen on patch days, everyone else in the group did too. No big deal. I snuck onto Dark Crag for a quick scenario on my Choppa Rumpfinga Smellsfunny. Hehe… Dirty little secrets. I hardly ever play the guy, but I get tells all the time about how sexy my name is. Yeah, that’s right. People like the smell of my… ah, right.

Anyways, Badlands was soon up again and unfortunately we were tossed out of VL just long enough for Destro to take LotD again. Expedition Resources flow like rivers of blood in City Sieges. Still holding onto my 2h axe, the group I was with decided premades would be the way to go. This time, I had a guard, dedicated healer, and was specced for the most damage I’ve ever done. I didn’t know Slayers could crit for 2400. O.o Hell, just hitting Chosen for 800 made my day. Suck off ya Ravage spamming sods! Taste the fury of Grimnir! An hour of total domination just let Destro pave their way right back into Altdorf for the second time. Bloody hell! Is no one doing RvR? Is this part of some grandiose plan to embarass their attempts to take our city? No matter, into Altdorf our fearsome 6-man goes. A dozen alliance members later and our 18 person warband took these foolish invaders to town. THERE WAS A FIREFIGHT! (If you haven’t seen Boondock Saints, you’re not a man yet. Go watch it. Now.) Plenty of high RR Destro showed up to play with us. I managed to sneak a Warlord Crest, three Invaders, win a gold bag (stupid belt…grr), and rack up a load of kills. Granted, we had one particular Bright Wizard who absolutely took the cake, but I felt quite effective anyway. Eventually, we griefed these guys right out of the instance. Hilarity! Of course, we couldn’t let well enough alone, and with 45m left on the siege, we hopped over to a different instance on good word that they fled there. More of the same! Lots of killing to be done, and at a framerate that could make angels cry. Or bleed tears. Or rip off their wings and beat someone to death with them. Silly angels.

1.3.2 is a welcome change in my book. After months on Badlands I’ve only seen a handful of City Sieges, and they were lag-tastic beasts at best. People constantly hopping around trying to find the least populated instance to farm for gear. This time however, we were on the hunt. I like hunting. Be it Altdorf or the Inevitable City, the changes from this patch are probably the best we’ve had in a long time. I was excited, invigorated, and thoroughly enjoying myself the entire time.

Here’s to more to come!