Despite being dead for 20 years, Warhammer Online is hosting a live event on a private server
For a dead MMO, Warhammer Online shows plenty of signs of life.
In the Empire, people celebrate the first day of summer with a holiday devoted to Sigmar, who is believed to have ascended to godhood on that day. Sigmartag is a day of resting, retelling stories based on Sigmar's heroic deeds, and eating "Sigmar's sausages", which every province has their own version of. In the fan-run private server Return of Reckoning, it's a time of war.
One of the things players lamented when Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning shut down after only five years of life was its Open Realm versus Realm conflicts, which Mythic Entertainment had adapted from the system it created for Dark Age of Camelot. By entering any of the oval-ish map areas nicknamed lakes, players joined a constant back-and-forth tug of war over contested ground between the factions. Lower-level player-characters would be temporarily boosted to help them compete, while those who were too high level for any given lake would be transformed into chickens as punishment.
During Return of Reckoning's Sigmartag event, which runs until May 30, Realm versus Realm is where it's at. You earn a Skull of Fallen Foe any time you kill an opposing player, which can be handed in at altars in each faction's capital city for a boost to your personal Renown. When your side collects enough skulls they earn a faction-wide Renown boost, starting at 10% for 100 skulls and going up to 50% for 5,000 skulls.
Every 1,000 skulls collected spawns a relic at either the Reikwald Fortress for Order, or The Maw for Destruction, which can be picked up and taken to the enemy's relic-spawning shrine to earn a stacking Renown boost of 50%. Intercepting the enemy relic also nets you a Renown boost of 25%. Given that the shrines are three maps apart, that won't be easy.
The Sigmartag event has also added seasonal treats that can be eaten for buffs, including Sigmar's Sizzling Sausage, Be'lakor's Baleful Bacon, and Festus' Finger-lickin' Frog Legs, as well as some hidden quests, a live event shop with 30 new dyes, and more. It's a healthy sign of life for an MMO that would be stone dead if it wasn't for the efforts of the Return of Reckoning team. You can find out more and learn about how to check it out for yourself at returnofreckoning.com.