State of the Union

It's been a little while since my last post, and that's partially because I've been enjoying WAR so much, partly distraction by more mundane matters, and mostly laziness.

I've just now reached level 28 with my Disciple, and I feel like I'm coming near to the end of tier 3 content. Given that I don't think tier 4 kicks in properly until level 32, I'm a little concerned about how to fill that XP gap. It seems to me that Mythic designed leveling with the assumption that you would complete almost every quest in almost every zone. I operated on an assumption from my WoW days - complete the zone you're in, then move on to the zone next door. I'll be interested to see if this causes problems.

I will be very happy to see the end of tier 3 RvR, and it's pretty much all due to the Tor Anroc scenario. This scenario isn't so bad in and of itself, but there are 2 factors which have rendered it incredibly irritating:

• Knockbacks into the lava - It's a zone which is designed to make classes with knockbacks feel like gods, and the rest of us like pinatas. It wouldn't be so bad if the lava was either instant kill, or didn't have that enjoying snare effect, but the way things are at the moment it is a fight which is largely built around knockbacks. This would be more acceptable if there were a defence against them other than not being near a class who has that particular type of attack.
• The only scenario that pops. I had hoped that the recent change to allow you to queue for any scenario regardless of which zone you were in would help in this regard, but if anything it has made it worse. I don't understand why only this scenario ever pops (i've tried queuing everything but Tor Anroc and waiting... and waiting...

It's not that I haven't had some enjoyment out of tier 3 rvr and Tor Anroc, it's just that it feels like a very limited version of what the realm versus realm concept could be applied to. I've taken part in one or two keep sieges, and they were much more what I envisaged realm versus realm being like, but at least for the moment they are fairly rare.

I'm also still unsure of the best way to spec my Disciple. I've been playing with a Torture build for most of the game so far, and this seems to be the best way for soloing. I very briefly gave a Sacrifice build a go, as this would allow me to concentrate on Strength gear without having to worry about Willpower, but I didn't enjoy it. I've read that Sacrifice comes into its own at level 30, so I may give it a go then. I'm also heavily tempted by a full Dark Rites build, and depending on what I find myself doing in the end-game I can definitely imagine myself going down that road.