Sandbox Interactive has announced an upcoming update to its flagship MMORPG Albion Online, containing massive updates to its existing guild Vs guild systems. Someone clearly rewatched the Helms Deep battle in Lord of the Rings and spent the next few days furiously coding, because sieges are about to get much bigger starting April 15th.
Kicking off we have the introduction of Fortifications, which does pretty much what you expect. If your guild holds any territory then you are going to want to spend some resources to put up defences to make them a bit harder to raid or conquer. Harder, but not impossible, because we also have a new way to attack.
If you happen upon a well-fortified location and the troops manning it have insinuated your father smells of Elderberrys’, then you can answer this sleight with the use of the new Siege Banners. These give attackers a way to weaken these bothersome walls, although defending guilds can also use them as further opportunities to stave off an assault.
Players heavy into guild warfare will know about Prime Time, an hour when territories can be raided or attacked for Season points. These combat hours will be optimized to better match action times across each server, hopefully leading to accessible wars for all. The Outlands territories are also getting new layouts to keep things fresh.
To keep you coming back and helping in your guild activities, Territory Activity Chests will be dangled as an incentive for being active around your territories. They will accumulate loot each day and can be opened after Prime Time, however, during this deadly hour competing guilds can raid these chests.
If you need to update your arsenal, three new Crystal Weapons will be introduced; the Artic Staff which barrages foes with icicles, a Phanton Twinblade which summons otherworldly spirits, and the Crystal Reaper, an Axe with a powerful dash attack that reduces spells’ cooldown. For existing weapons, there are two new Hammer Spells to master, with a Powerful swing letting you pound foes into the ground, followed up with a Seismic Tremor for AOE damage.
For players more into hosting than fighting, the new Spectator Mode will allow you to set up your own tournaments of whatever size you want. Whilst this mostly benefits content creators, it can still but a nice way to spend a weekend; watching your friends batter each other for your private amusement.
Albion Online is available from the App Store and Google Play.
