I found a fantastic interview on WarCry yesterday that features a Q and A at PAX with the Warhammer Online PAX team. In the interview Matt Lowery asks the WAR Pax team many fantastic questions but the one that stood out to me most was the change to the morale system.
WarCry: Can you explain a bit about how exactly the Morale system works? How do you gain it and use it?
Warhammer PAX: Being in combat. With Morale, we actually just made a major change in Morale. It’s one of those things that it’s almost like a living being, it’s still changing a lot. It use to be where you would actually spend your Morale at different levels. So what we are doing now is giving a lot more variety to Morale abilities at different ranks. So anytime you are in combat, your Morale will be building, and then you will be able to use those Morales in your power scale. So as you are in combat longer you can use more powerful Morale abilities. So lets say your Morale bar is at 80%, and you use your 80% morale ability, you don’t lose the morale, instead there is a timer before you can use the ability again. So ofcourse the more powerful the ability the longer the timer before you can use it again. So that’s the current state, I don’t know what it will be exactly in the end, but that’s how its being done now.
I’m not sure how I feel about this change. Before this change players would need to gain morale during combat and then spend it on abilities. You could use your abilities that use low morale and attack in little spurts or you could save up your morale and use it all on one of your high end abilities. However, now the system doesn’t expend your morale at all. You are gaining morale and will be able to spam your abilities (on a timer) regardless of worrying about losing the morale you’ve built up.
I suppose this could offer more diversity in combat and also increase the speed and flow of each fight. I’ll look at it in a positive light for now. Check out the full Q and A! It’s definitely worth the read.