Major WAR update in December

Further to the announcement that two new classes are coming to Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, Mythic boss Mark Jacobs has revealed more details of the update they'll arrive in.

WAR's first major patch, 1.1, will arrive in December. As well as the introduction of the Dark Elf Black Guard and Empire Knight of the Blazing Sun, it will include new systems, content and a number of fixes.

Improved rewards for taking part in WAR's realm-versus-realm warfare are at the fore. As well as better gear, itemisation, higher-quality drops, and improved rewards for taking part in open-world RVR, dedicated warmongers will be able to benefit from an RVR Influence system similar to the one that rewards players for taking part in the game's Public Quests.

A number of new quest chains, Lairs, and Tome of Knowledge unlocks (achievements, in other words) will also be added in patch 1.1 to keep the player-versus-environment crowd happy.

Perhaps the biggest impact on many players' quality of life will come from free server transfers from select high- or low-population servers to select mid-population ones. To those regularly stuck in queues to get in Scenarios on their server - or to get online at all - this will be a godsend, and might help even out some of the population imbalance problems the game is currently suffering from.

Every class is promised a few improvements and balance changes, the "slow and cumbersome" mail system will be overhauled, and Mythic is also working to improve the performance of the game on lower-spec PCs.

A very generous Christmas present for Warhammer Online players from Mythic, then, although Jacobs did add the caveat that the feature list was "what we hope to include" and "not a guarantee of any kind".