Hammerwiki:Capital city

In Warhammer Online, a capital city is the headquarters and the main source of the war effort for each army. Capital cities can be attacked, temporarily raided and even partially razed through the campaigns. Capital city zones are in the fourth and final tier of the campaign map, according to the advancement of characters through the game. The 'King' or leader of each army will be resident in their capital city, and it is possible to fight and capture an army's King during a city siege. In addition, each city contains facilities such as a Bank, an Auction House and a Library.

It is important to note that these cities' size and magnitude overshadow any city previously seen in any MMO to date. Their scenery and design is complex, creative, and inspires curiosity and exploration (indeed, cities are large enough to explore). Simply in size, the two capital cities are as large or larger as all three of the racial cities offered in the World of Warcraft combined. They also offer numerous secrets and hidden wonders, as well as myriad quests, instances, and tasks to accomplish.

Living Cities
Cities in WAR are considered "Living Cities", a term used to describe how cities dynamically grow and improve over time according to their relative success in the RvR conflict.

City Rank
A city begins as a Poor city, and may eventually become Prosperous. This is considered the city's Rank. Currently, cities can attain ranks from 1 to 5, although the names and benefits of these ranks are mostly unknown. Leveling to rank 5 is estimated to take a significant amount of time (months not weeks).

The rank of a capital city is proportional to the success of the players. City rank contributions are determined by what zone players adventure in, not by their army. A city's rank is tied into WAR's campaign system, as well as PvE achievements, and other factors such as crafting. The more you achieve, the richer your city becomes; gaining victory points in the campaign and successfully completing PvE quests all helps to create a thriving economy, causing capitals to become more prosperous. This will change the look of the city (a poor city might mostly be a slum covered in garbage, while a prosperous city will mostly be rich & clean neighborhoods). City guards will also level up with your city, so at rank 1 a guard will be a peasant drafted into the army and at rank 5 you will have well armored knights defending the city. Additional quests and features within the city will also open up when your city gains rank. For example, while Altdorf is poor, a player may overhear a peasant talking about seeing a giant "rat man"; as the city becomes more and more prosperous the culmination of the story will reveal Skaven tunnels under the city, allowing for players to explore new territory.

In addition to providing friendly players with special events, and new quests, prosperous cities are a source of wealth and opportunity to enemy looters. Capturing a city allows the attackers to take part in the events and quests that are available within the city, meaning that rank 5 cities are a much more valuable target to the opposing realm. By opening up the World Map, a player can then see the rank of a city, and see what events are taking place in the city at this time. This allows for greater coordination among players of a realm for offensive pushes in the campaign.

Player Statues
Inside the city there are statues of players whom have gotten the most renown for the past week. When a city is sacked by an enemy these statues can then be destroyed.

Calender Events
Several festivals and holidays occur in capital cities on certain in-game dates. Examples of these are: Day of the Dead style festival, carnivals, festival days, and Pie week.

Capital City Capture
Once two of the three fortresses of one realm have fallen, that realm's capital city zone becomes "attack eligible". The attackers can then enter the city, which is treated as an instanced scenario, holding up to two or three warbands' worth of players from each side. The capture has three stages: Invasion, Pillage and Looting, and Capturing the King.

Only Tier 4 players may participate in the City Capture proper, but T1-T3 players may play the Altdorf War Quarters or Undercroft scenarios, which contribute victory points to the capture.

When a city is being attacked, its normal functions (merchants, auctioneers, etc) are suspended and moved to a refugee camp in a protected area of the nearest fortress zone. T1-T3 players are banned from the city during the attack, and are moved to the refugee camp if they are in the city when it is attacked.

Invasion Phase
1. Each side has a basic PQ - Stage 1 is to kill defenders (or invaders), destroy (or repair) objects, and maintain control of Battlefield Objectives.

2. If one side completes Stage 1, a defending (or invading) lord with minions will spawn for stage 2. The stage can be completed by dominating the BOs and killing enemy players as in the first stage (approximately 9.5 minutes in an uncontested instance), or the lord can be killed, which with a successful warband focusing on him (ignoring minions) can be faster. For Adell, taunting him causes him to react with an attack that one-shots tanks and those nearby, so it must be avoided. Full greater wards are required on the tanks, and helpful for others who may get some minion damage. The minions have strange leashing behavior, and will run around one-shotting people across the map if not tanked near their spawn.

3. Both stages can be repeated indefinitely, until either one hour has passed or one side gains enough victory points to have 100% control. The losing side will not be actively kicked out at this time, but dying and respawning will move them to the nearest fortress, and they are not allowed back in.

Pillage and Looting Phase
Public Quests, Quests, Dungeons, looting, pillaging, and eventually King are unlocked to the attacker. When an opposing capital is sacked, players are able to loot and pillage the city. Attacking players are able to break down doors, attack the inhabitants, loot their possessions, and set buildings on fire. There are landmark buildings to pillage and special NPCs to fight. Many of these encounters are available only once, thus the ones who actually take part in the initial War Quarter attack and who do most of the work capturing the city will be first on the scene and will have the first shot at some of these one-off encounters.

In each city there are two large areas where the attacker must complete public quests before they can assault the faction leader, or "King". For example in Altdorf you must complete public quests in the Temple of Sigmar and Bright Wizard College before you can attack Emperor Karl Franz. In the Inevitable City, the equivalent PQs are at the Sacellum and The Monolith. Attackers have one hour to complete both, otherwise the city attack will fail.

The Sacellum PQ includes several lord bosses who require Superior Wards. The final boss, Engra, has multiple abilities that can one-shot a player - he creates flaming patches on the ground that kill anyone who walks on them, and has an equally deadly AOE attack. The AOE is always preceded by the line "You are weak. The weak die." The flaming patches, however, are especially nasty because they frequently are not visible to players who were not in the immediate area when they were created (ie, because they died and had to respawn) - no matter how far their display setting are turned up. He also likes to put them on the stairs leading into the arena, which respawning players have to run through to get to him. The best strategy is to kite him around the arena and keep hitting him with DoTs.

Capturing the King
The actual king event is an instanced encounter consisting of 24 players (four groups of six) versus the king. This fight is the culmination of the PvE quest chapters in the game, and as a result rewards successful players with some of the best items in the game.

Re-taking a city
Players from the attacking realm will have roughly 24 hours (not certain) to freely pillage a fallen city. Once this time period has expired the city gates reopen for home characters who can then siege the city from the WarQuarter in a reverse of other faction capturing the city. After the city is re-captured the campaign for that battlefront is re-set.

Development History
On July 11, 2008, EAMythic released a new update stating that only Altdorf and The Inevitable City will be included in the game content by the time of the official game launch. They have stated that they did not have enough time to fully design and finish all six capital cities, so they decided to shelf the other four in order to make two cities that were "Not good, not great, but fabulous," in time for the game launch. It has, however, been also noted that the other four cities are expected to enter the game in patches post-launch. -- MMORPG.com Source

Shelved Cities
These cities appeared in the beta, but were removed from the game prior to launch: Karaz-a-Karak, Karak Eight Peaks, Lothern, Fist of Malekith.