The Austin Game Developers Conference is currently under way, and Mythic Entertainment Executive Producer Jeff Hickman spoke candidly about the mistakes the company made with Warhammer Online that have "haunted" the team for the past year. According to Gamasutra, Hickman outlined the three main errors that Mythic "should not have made" with the game:

1. PvE is too easy in the beginning. "It doesn't make you thrilled to do it," Hickman said. "The game has suffered immensely for it."
2. There is "little reason to socialize" in the game since friends aren't required to play, which is partly due to the fact that you can solo a lot of the content.
3. The team "missed the mark" on the game's economy.

With that being said, Hickman did emphasize that public quests and open grouping are "major breakthroughs" for Warhammer Online. He also discussed the changes that will need to be made to the game to localize and culturalize it for a Korean audience. "If you have a successful game in North America, you have this tendency to go 'we have a great game.' Don't do that. Learn from the past," Hickman said.

Do you find yourself reminiscing fondly of the days spent battling in Mourkain Temple?  Who can forget the scenario that taught us the true importance of the Thing?  Well, this weeknd you'll have the chance to relive that epic experience first hand!

That's right, this weekend ushers in a return to everyone's favorite Tier 2 Scenario; Mourkain Temple! Get in there for all of the brutal action as the forces of Order and Destruction attempt to get the Thing, kill the guy with the Thing and pretty much destroy everything in their path as they strive to complete all of this Weekend Event's tasks and earn the title "Marshreaper!"  The "Battlemarsh" Weekend Event will start tomorrow morning, September 11th, and continue on until Monday morning, September 14th. So get in there and do something to your enemies!

Sadly, I predict we will encounter many, many individuals who have not learned the Thing's mighty lesson.

Nate Levy, Warhammer Online's Combat and Careers Team Lead, has written a dev diary entry that outlines the crowd control changes players can expect to see in patch 1.3.2. These changes follow the radii reduction on AoE effects and the introduction of the Resolute Defense ability in 1.3.0b.

To start things off, many crowd control effect durations will be slightly reduced. Also, some CC abilities will be moving to positions that make them more of a deliberate choice to obtain. "Many AoE CC Morales will shift from Morale Rank 1 or 2 to Morale Rank 3 or 4," Levy said. In addition, the distribution of crowd control abilities will be moved to defensive careers since DPSers bring damage to RvR. This shift is a long-term goal and will not be completed in one patch.

Lastly, the team is adding a new effect called "Stagger" in patch 1.3.2. According to Levy, "when you Stagger an enemy, they'll be briefly disabled and unable to move or take any actions, just like a Stun or a Knockdown, but with the critical difference that the Stagger will immediately break if they suffer any damage." You can read the full dev diary entry below.

Regular readers might recall the love/hate relationship I have with Warhammer Online; I was a fan of the IP since my junior high days, back in the early 90s. When it was finally confirmed that Mythic would be developing the long-awaited Warhammer Fantasy MMO, I was more excited for its release than any other game in production, at the time. But as we all know, things didn't turn out quite the way many of us predicted; check out this editorial I wrote back in July if you'd like to know why.

WAR just turned one year old a few days ago; Mythic celebrated its one-year anniversery on Aug. 31 and is currently hosting an in-game event to commemorate its birthday, called "The Wild Hunt." Ironically, I also stumbled upon this Warhammer Alliance thread (via Massivley) from one year ago, in which players created a virtual "Warhammer Online Time Capsule," making predictions about the state of WAR one year into the future (e.g., this month). Needless to say, some of the more...ambitious predictions didn't come true.

But if you're one of the thousands of players like myself, who loved the MMO and had high hopes for it, but left last spring (or during the "November Exodus"), you might be curious to find out whether or not the game is worth playing nowadays. Has Land of the Dead and the other recent patches fixed the most extreme gameplay problems and annoyances we faced? Is Teir 4 finally worth playing, and are classes more balanced than they were six months ago?

It's something I'd like to find out first-hand, and I need your help!

With the Wild Hunt in full swing, it's time to unveil our guide to the Hunter's Vale dungeon!  This guide has the location for all 6 of the Fallen Hunters, as well as a map.

The Vale is accessed by right clicking on the Vale Vines that spawn inside of RvR lakes. If you look at your map, the vines will be nearby the location of the Curse of Kurnous PQ. You can enter the Vale regardless of the current state of the PQ, although you cannot enter while in combat. When inside the instance, you receive the effects of Bolster for that tier.  The instance is laid out in a spiraling woodland path.  As you can see by the handy map I've provided, the path winds around the entire instance...

Be sure to check it out here!

The Penny Arcade Expo kicks off tomorrow to begin a weekend full of gaming, and members of the ZAM staff are currently on their way to Seattle to bring you exclusive coverage of the festival. In case you're unfamiliar with PAX, the event was created by Penny Arcade's Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik to focus on tabletop, console and PC games. The first PAX was held in 2004 and has exponentially grown in popularity. In fact, this year's convention has already sold out.

That's where we come in. If you're not able to attend PAX, then we want to bring PAX to you. You can check out all of our news from the floor on our PAX news page, which is also accessible via a banner on ZAM.com. To be honest, our schedule is packed. We'll provide you with news on Aion, EVE Online, Global Agenda, Lord of the Rings Online, Dungeons & Dragons: Eberron Unlimited, Star Trek Online, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Warhammer Online, League of Legends and more. MMOs certainly have a strong presence at the festival, so keep an eye on our coverage for updates from our team in Seattle.

Our readers on the East Coast may be happy to hear that PAX East will be held in Boston from March 26-28, 2010, marking the first time the Penny Arcade Expo will be held outside of Washington. While it's exciting to have another PAX to look forward to, we're completely focused on this weekend.

The Wild Hunt live event is in full swing, but that doesn't mean the team has stopped squashing bugs in Warhammer Online. A bunch of hotfixes were just implemented that cover numerous aspects of the game, from correcting an issue with the damage dealt by the Warpblade Assassin’s “Throwing Star” ability in the Warpblade Tunnels dungeon to clearing the ramp in Butcher's Pass of unnecessary objects.

You can read the full list of hotfixes after the jump.

It was announced today that the Penny Arcade Expo has completely sold out, but gamers who were lucky enough to already get their badges have a ton of MMO excitement waiting for them in Seattle from Sept. 4-6, or you can keep an eye on ZAM.com for all our PAX news.

We've already reported there will be a playable Star Trek Online demo on the floor and CCP will showcase EVE Online at the convention, but that's only a taste of what's in store at this year's expo. Keep reading after the jump for just some of the other games you can expect to see on the floor at PAX 2009.

UPDATE: The maintenance was completed at 11:50 a.m. EDT, so the servers are back up and the Wild Hunt has begun!

As we've reported, Mythic is celebrating the one-year anniversary of Warhammer Online with the Wild Hunt live event, which is the game's biggest live event to date. Maintenance is currently under way on all North American and Oceanic servers to enable the event, and they should be back up by 2 p.m. EDT. Once the servers are up, the Wild Hunt will begin!

The hunt ends Sept. 7, but weekend-only events will be held in September to continue the celebration. Also, all players will earn a 20 percent experience and Renown bonus throughout the month, and don't forget to keep an eye in your in-game mailbox for anniversary items. Enjoy the festivities! WAAAGH!

I'm a fan of the show "Ace of Cakes" on the Food Network, which is why I'm excited to see Duff and the crew from Charm City Cakes make a Big Red Squig cake on an episode debuting tomorrow, Aug. 27, at 10 p.m. ET/PT. Check out the promo to see video of the huge cake being created.

If you can't watch it tomorrow night, the episode will air again on Friday at 1 a.m. and on Sept. 8 at 8 p.m. The Warhammer cake was unveiled at Games Day Baltimore in May and footage from the event will be shown in the episode.