The whole "warlock controlling the wraithguard" thing is just the lore explanation of why are you playing as a construct with a soul of a dead eldar inside, in terms of gameplay will be like MAX on PS2, just our terminator equivalent. No pets.
I think Joram's right. So far the only NPCs the devs mentioned will be Nids and base defenders. I'm not worried about the implementation of WG. I don't think the Behaviour team is that dumb to make them pets.
Yeah Joram's right. It's important to the devs, and for the lore I guess, for you to have a connected identity with your character. That means they don't want you switching to a "different person" unless it's a hero. So the warlock explaination is just a way of connecting your character, the warlock, to the wraithguard you're actually playing. And for anyone who's uncertain, this is what Steven Lumpkin told me very directly a couple months ago: playing a Wraithguard will have no functional difference from playing a terminator in terms of how they spawn or how they are operated. They'll have very different guns and equipment, of course, but otherwise you'll play them in the exact same 3rd person shooter kind of way, like a MAX suit in PS2. Their involvement with warlocks is lore-only. So yeah. /thread?
Well that's good news. Was that statement from Steven Lumpkin, in person or via a post of some type? Some type of proof would be great.
In person, in response to me asking that exact question. It was a while ago and I don't really feel like looking it up, it arose in one of the half dozen threads addressing this aspect of wraithguard at their release, which should be easy to find in search. Plus, it just doesn't make any sense for it to be any other way. Making wraithguard some kind of remote pet would be a balancing nightmare, an AI/programming/pathfinding nightmare, a serverside performance nightmare, a publicity nightmare since people would personally play the heavy class in every faction except Eldar, and a progression nightmare since pets are invariably an order of magnitude less effective than human counterparts and nobody would spend exp on them. So even before I asked, I was pretty sure, because I know the devs are talented and wouldn't do something that outright stupid. Getting a reply was just to confirm.
Yup that info was released with the Eldar newsletter back in December 2013 (wow it's already been a year around here...), the info was confusing and Steven clarified it in one of the 5 threads about wraithguard.
I searched " pet class " under thread titles and got zero results for entire forums. That is basically the question in this thread. Wraiths as pet for warlock, or as a spawnable ally who does what he wants ( autonomous ). The most relatable terminology in gaming for a class with an underling / pet / minion is " pet class ". Previous posts are mostly correct. This question has been raised previously many times. Doesn't seem like it will be a thing ( although I've stated that before and been wrong ). BM hunters and Demo Locks should stay in WoW anyway... Although this would have been somewhat interesting. Iyanden Spiritseer could have fit in well, with 1 or 2 wraiths as pets... The complaints of not controlling wraiths would be endless, However. I still feel people are worried about balancing more than anything. It's funny to me really... I'm sure more than a few don't want to chase a fleeing pet class just to get murdered by pets ( it's a thing those classes tend to do, kite ). But on the other hand they would promote something like one-shot sniper kills, indefinite flying and kill streaks that summon ridiculously overpowered units. All different paths to the same goal... Preferred play style. Not having a go or anything, just seems people sandbag each other without looking from someone else's perspective first. Are we role playing the inquisition guys?
The way I see it, from what I have gleaned over this last year and a half, is that Warlocks will have the ability to "pilot" a wrathguard once they unlock the ability. So when they decide to "be a wrathguard" their body will stay in the orbiting space ship while they "commune" or "pilot" their wrathguard. This doesent include the rp cost and the global cooldown but I do think those will be in there also. All in all I think it is a great balance of having the wrathguard in game and not completely raping the fluff. It makes since doing it this way as spirit seers are the ones that tend to help control the big guys on the field and it will help limit their numbers. I am very interested on how they (the devs) are going to do their weapon loadouts. Will we be able to pick close combat and ranged or will we be stuck with only one or the other? And which weapons sets are we going to see out of the 4 that are available on tabletop?
