Give us your feedback on the November Letter to the Players. [Archive]

Heideggar

10-28-2004, 02:23 PM

1) Turbine Billing

Ibn, didn't you guys say all the billing stuff would be done by the end of the summer? It's quickly approaching November, and while that's a couple months past the end of summer, you're still not done. Migrating existing accounts is a difficult/delicate situation, and if it's still a step that needs to be done, when can we expect this to end and see some real content into OUR game?

I'm glad my money helped new players and not existing players. Good show of priorities.

2) In celebration of this anniversary, the Council of Sages will be providing all players with a small gift in the November event.

I hope the gift isn't lag, bugs, faulty gameplay, rollbacks, and exploitation : )

(Yeah, I'm _real_ positive today : ) )

3) Fixes:

Rapid-Fire Bow Bug Fix
Salvaging Spells
PvP Weapon Changes - Ibn, there are 4 suites of PvP weapons, not 3, and the 4th should be balanced with these changes. Did you guys do that? (4th being loot generated weapons, which should be #1 best). I'm glad you guys are spending some time to help PvP. Many may disagree, but it's important to have this fixed. Not 100% fixed, but pretty close is good enough. The amount of time/resources spent tweaking and retweaking is not a pleasant feeling though. Get it done.

4) Nothing else? We get so many patches fixing things and not many that actually puts in new features. Disappointing.

In Development:
Masks/Guises in December: While I don't care too much about this, my friends do, and this is BS.

Social Centers: I'm glad you guys are trying to help promote social interaction in and around towns, but nothing you said is that big of a deal. One (1) good sized allegiance moving their portal/buff/tinker bots into a town does more for social interaction in towns than you guys have been able to do in a very long time. The casinos would help this, but you'd have to make the casinos worth going to, which you AREN'T doing. You say to make it attractive for all level ranges, but how is revising newbie dungeons going to address higher level ranges? What will these 3 towns offer to higher level ranges that isn't there now? You don't mention them, which makes me feel like you don't have any good plans?

Creature War Magic: If you wanna talk about balancing risk vs reward go to VoD. btw, you guys said you'd be tweaking creature war magic shortly after you implemented these changes. Now, so war casters can get a bit better improved damage at lower levels, EVERYONE gets to deal with these changes. I like a challenge and all, but some places are just bad. Worse of all, you guys will end up spending time and resources to something that I didn't feel many gave a big whoop about. How's that work out!?

Arch Magi

10-28-2004, 02:25 PM

As a player who hasn't gone "Red" or "Pink" more than 1/2 dozen times since 3 months after retail release, because I CHOOSE not to, I have 1 word for this months LttP.

THIN

PvP, Salvaging Spells (that should have been in game LAST MONTH), Masks (that should have been in game LAST MONTH), and what else? Oh, a "gift" for 5 years. BFHD. Unless you guys start putting content in, I don't expect to see a "gift" for "Year 6".

BTW, when is the MAJORITY going to get to use the new billing system? It doesn't even hint at December or January.

Sort of made me wonder about the article I read in the free IGN magazine I get about the game developer "Acclaim".

AzulDrakkon

10-28-2004, 02:33 PM

Stop crying against the PvP issues, boohoo I have to wait one month for content!!! Its not like there won't be blackmire 6 or whatever. they waited 3 months to give us a fix.

bertman

10-28-2004, 02:38 PM

Speaking of missing spells, you still owe us a tinker and a buff for the magic defense modifiers that wands and weapons sometimes have.

I want to say that I don't PK, and I don't care whether other people do or not. I also like to solo hunt a lot, but I will do fellowships for quests, not because I have to but because I want to survive. That having been said, I am opposed to forced grouping, requiring one to be in a fellowship to complete a quest. And I really don't care for quests that require PK or PKL to get through. I'm sure that there are reasons for these types of quests to be in the game, certainly one good reason is to try something different from time to time, which I applaud, but I am hoping that the rewards for solo and non-pk players are not forgotten.

OK now, on the reward thingy: Thanks in advance for the thought. I hope this is something that is not a pennant, and I hope it is not a raiment. It would be nice if it was something of which there were at least 12 variations, thta you could only get if your character existed before the patch day, and stopped being available at the end of the patch cycle.

Vlad Morbius

10-28-2004, 02:43 PM

I only have one thing to add to this IBN, what is happening as far as the balance issue? I don't even see mention of it in the in-concept section. :confused:

Gatt

10-28-2004, 02:44 PM

<<The casinos would help this, but you'd have to make the casinos worth going to, which you AREN'T doing.>>

Casino's aren't all that bad as they are now.

A 100 High Stakes run right now will...

1. Give me 50% of the money back give or take a couple percent.
2. Yield about 1.2 million xps in trophies and triangles. Yes, nothing to the high level, but massive to the reroll.
3. Give approximately 15 Gems of Stillness, perhaps 30 Treated Kits if you want them, and 15 Mana Stones saving a little cash or filling a focusing stone.
4. Give a pull or two on the Golden Chest, which IMO is the best Chest in the game atm. I pull minors and double minors out of that thing everytime, I've got like 4 Majors out of it. One of which was a work 6 Celdon Leggings AL 269, Major Coord. I've only pulled maybe 10-15 times.

Only thing I think they really need to look at with those chests is the Small Shard on the Pack Doll Gambling Wheel. Completely useless. Couldn't something else go in there like SSK, or Marble key, or Granite Key, or (nudge, nudge) new Pack Dolls?

Lauski

10-28-2004, 02:48 PM

IBN, cheers on the bow bug.

Question though, it didn't make sense before and it still doesn't make sense now as you reused your text regarding the different "PVP Weapon Suites".

Question1:
You say, "first... second... third" -- it almost appears you are ranking them from most effective to least effective. I hope you are just in fact, listing the different weapon suites and they will ALL be effective, just in different scenarios.

Ex: Tinked armor vs. GSx, Mage/Archer vs. Melee (here we debate shield no shield), etc...

Question2:
One other thing I'd like official comment on, did missle projectile speed get increased... assuming it did, will this transfer over to all weapons, not just PvP ones? I don't want this to die out... I was excited about a better chance to hit, especially if you are putting the damage down a bit.

Yung Kin

10-28-2004, 02:48 PM

No mention of considering a new class of weapons...namely Two-handed and dual weapon combinations. And I'm not talking about being able to use two hands on any 'current' weapon or to wield any two of your current weapons, but instead a new class of weapon type, where the underlying engine interaction and mechanics are no different from current weapons (using Palum's idea - give damage love, add a new animation set, and remove the ability to wield a shield while wielding this new melee weap)

Kudos to the PvP mechanics updates. It seems you took a pretty good look at what the actual DoT is and decided on a standard. I hope you stick with your standard.

No mention of considering removing the /house mansion_recall ability now that all Monarchs can tie to towns...it would have been a mistake to do so before, but now that you have tech, where an allegiance can recall and congregate without having to giveup 33% of their portal ties...many folx have entertained the idea that this /simple/ tech change would mean towns would find larger congregations of people for that whole 'Social Center' aspect you're taking lots of time out of content designers' schedule to adjust, without any guarantee of a return on your investment. This single dynamic might even change the face of AC for the better, in one foul swoop.

Thanks for the small gift from the Council of Sages.

Frank The Knife

10-28-2004, 02:49 PM

they waited 3 months to give us a fix

I think it was more like 5+

Jin Saotome

10-28-2004, 02:52 PM

Eh... I can't say more than 'looks like the PK's got to crying and got their way again'. More importantly the mages. Sword and UA got bumped DOWN? This is only going to promote more gang-banging, unless the slayer element really did get a huge boost. Have you ever tried to hit a maxed-health slidecasting Mage wearing all Ancient Armor? You're LUCKY if you're able to get a full power swing with anything without being lagged and dragged right into a spell. It's all about speed and sticky melee, bleh.

Tinker spells, good, this will keep people from complaining any more, hehe.

Rapid bow bug fixed? Cool... now stop slidecasting and jumpspin... we'll be good then!

Billing! When does this apply to normal old accounts? I'd like to swicth over from Zone as soon a spossible! Also, will we need new port numbers and such? I have to clear this with my router you know, hehe.

Arch Magi

10-28-2004, 02:53 PM

Stop crying against the PvP issues, boohoo I have to wait one month for content!!! Its not like there won't be blackmire 6 or whatever. they waited 3 months to give us a fix.

Um, I'm still waiting for THIS MONTHS meaningful content.

I am one of those twisted people that don't think that spawning 100 VoD type creatures in the middle of a town thereby causing massive lag is "new content". But then again, I'm also one who didn't care for "fishing holes" or "chess boards" (which was done because 1 Dev had a thing for "Battle Chess" and it was done "completely on his time").

So excuse me if I don't like the fact that is sounds like this will be AT LEAST the second month in a row of "little content".

On the plus side, this should mean that this will be the second month in a row that there won't be massive bugs, hotfixes or rollback.

:rolleyes:

Nocturne

10-28-2004, 02:57 PM

This looks to be an exciting even, Ibn! Tell them devs to keep up the good work! I'm interested in these new wields... Do I have to scrap my 191% Fire Rending Xbow? :)

Chrono

10-28-2004, 02:58 PM

PvP bow nerf: WHY!? It's not like we can hit anything as it is. Tweaked down very slightly: what does this mean?

Myk

10-28-2004, 02:58 PM

The Atlatls and Crossbows are also having their damage increased. Unfortunately it was necessary to tweak the Bows down very slightly in order to meet our goals. Bows will do smaller critical hits than Swords in the same class, but have a higher average damage over time.

Do you have any clue that bow dosent hit enough to be worth using in PvP? So lower the damage bow at all juat makes it worse. If anythng bow should have higher crits and higher normal hits than sword. I reaaly wish you people would put out a nice long article explaining the ideas on how you are going to fix missile weapons and how these changes are working to that goal. The changes you are making doesnt seem to help at all.

lets make a short list

1. Aegis on loot bow....worthless in PvP because loot imbued bows do not do anywhere near the damege of a weeping plus all it takes is a loather and the loot bow is completely worthless

2. Flatter missile pathing and increased speed on quest PvP missile weapons, An "ok" start but the speed needs to be increased again by about 100% to make this worth anything.

What we deen is actually Increased speeded on missile weapon by about 100% of the current speed and an aegis dip for missile weeping weapons. Make the dip just elemental dip for melee weapons, you bring your weeping bow to a place, use something on it and bang it has an aegis ability. then drop the melee mod to +12% total.

I think my idea would be much better than the fixes for missile weapons put in place as of late.

I say increase the speed, I mean the speed of the arrows not increasing the speed at which you shoot. Also I used +12% melee because currently if you make a dark bow the worst melee mod on it will a -5 then buffed with defender 7 that brings it to +12%

PLease read this and let me know what the devs thoughts on it are.

Minnie the Minx

10-28-2004, 03:01 PM

UGH no offense but where is the content ???? As a monarch of almost 3k people on VT i see more and more becoming bored, I am hoping for great things in the Expansion but at this rate no one will be around to enjoy it, Sure we could always spend another month hunting and repeating quests and chatting but even that gets old at times :( very disapointed with the Lttp

Chupon

10-28-2004, 03:01 PM

MisatoX

10-28-2004, 03:03 PM

bah, you beat me to the question chup :p

interested in seeing the town changes come decemeber :) would love to see more people in towns

Chrono

10-28-2004, 03:05 PM

What we deen is actually Increased speeded on missile weapon by about 100% of the current speed and an aegis dip for missile weeping weapons. Make the dip just elemental dip for melee weapons, you bring your weeping bow to a place, use something on it and bang it has an aegis ability. then drop the melee mod to +12% total.

I think my idea would be much better than the fixes for missile weapons put in place as of late.

I say increase the speed, I mean the speed of the arrows not increasing the speed at which you shoot. Also I used +12% melee because currently if you make a dark bow the worst melee mod on it will a -5 then buffed with defender 7 that brings it to +12%

PLease read this and let me know what the devs thoughts on it are.

This man speaks gospel truth.

UGH no offense but where is the content ???? As a monarch of almost 3k people on VT i see more and more becoming bored, I am hoping for great things in the Expansion but at this rate no one will be around to enjoy it, Sure we could always spend another month hunting and repeating quests and chatting but even that gets old at times :( very disapointed with the Lttp

Content is never specifically mentioned in Lttp, you should know that. Also, we should expect a few light months, heavier on bug fixes, they told us about this.

turnstyles

10-28-2004, 03:06 PM

Minnie the Minx

10-28-2004, 03:09 PM

I hope your right Chrono and they will suprise us with great things :o

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:10 PM

The Weeping Sword, at the top of the stack, will not have the critical hit damage that it had prior to the June changes, but its damage over time will go up thanks to an improved variance.

My two concerns:

Will it be enough DOT to beat a mage who just stands there and heals?

Will it be enough Crit damage to make a dent in the max health characters?

In my opinion the sword should have been put back to where it was prior to the nerf.

The DoT will be higher than it was prior to the nerf.

Chupon

10-28-2004, 03:11 PM

That's always how it's been Elly :p

Content isn't really given away in the LTTP and only slightly in the Teaser.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:12 PM

[Sarcasm on]

The amount of content in this patch will keep me busy for weeks!

[Sarcasm off]

Really, is this what is is going to be like to ToD?

The LttP does not discuss new content. It never has. There's no way to judge the amount of new content from the LttP.

The LttP communicates system and game dynamic changes, and warns folks of things that they need to be warned of in advance -- like needing to keep a pack space open.

We could be introducing half a dozen new quests and dungeons and you'd never read about it in the LttP.

Is that a hint? Maybe. :)

Vlad Morbius

10-28-2004, 03:17 PM

IBN, i know you'd prefer it if all us pesky little melees would fall off the end of Dereth, but can you respond to the question please. What's happening with the balance issue?

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:18 PM

Ibn, didn't you guys say all the billing stuff would be done by the end of the summer? It's quickly approaching November, and while that's a couple months past the end of summer, you're still not done. Migrating existing accounts is a difficult/delicate situation, and if it's still a step that needs to be done, when can we expect this to end and see some real content into OUR game?

I'm glad my money helped new players and not existing players. Good show of priorities.

We did say that we'd hoped to have the migration happen by the end of the summer. Unfortunately we determined that we couldn't meet that goal while still ensuring the integrity of your character and account data.

There's no way we could do a migration without building our billing and login system first. The new systems that "helped new players" are the same systems that you'll be using once we migrate. There's no way to migrate without them.

I don't currently have an ETA on when migration will start. As soon as we have one that's firm, we'll announce it.

PvP Weapon Changes - Ibn, there are 4 suites of PvP weapons, not 3, and the 4th should be balanced with these changes. Did you guys do that?
(4th being loot generated weapons, which should be #1 best).

Loot-generated weapons aren't currently feasible in most PvP combat. We've got some ideas to fix that, but they're not currently on the schedule. Most of them are very similar to what's already been discussed on the PvP forums, such as an imbue to add a human slayer quality to loot weapons.

One (1) good sized allegiance moving their portal/buff/tinker bots into a town does more for social interaction in towns than you guys have been able to do in a very long time.

You're absolutely right, and some of the changes will encourage this. Unfortunately any more details that I provide would be spoilers.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:20 PM

[list]No mention of considering a new class of weapons...namely Two-handed and dual weapon combinations. And I'm not talking about being able to use two hands on any 'current' weapon or to wield any two of your current weapons, but instead a new class of weapon type, where the underlying engine interaction and mechanics are no different from current weapons (using Palum's idea - give damage love, add a new animation set, and remove the ability to wield a shield while wielding this new melee weap)

There are no plans to add this anytime in the forseeable future. What you're describing is non-trivial and would be more suitable for an expansion pack than the several months of sustained live work that it would require.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:22 PM

Sword and UA got bumped DOWN?

All swords and UA either remained the same or went up in total damage over time, with the exception of the Phantom Katar.

MannyCalavera

10-28-2004, 03:22 PM

"The Atlatls and Crossbows are also having their damage increased. Unfortunately it was necessary to tweak the Bows down very slightly in order to meet our goals. Bows will do smaller critical hits than Swords in the same class, but have a higher average damage over time."

Can you clarify this? Does that mean the Human Slayer effect on missile weapons went up, so they needed to bring bow down a bit or did bow just get nerfed all together? If it does the same damage, thats fine, but bow certainly didn't need to be nerfed in PvP!

Also, any decisions been reached on adding an imbue to loot bows to make the arrows fly faster? Decide against it or something that will be put in when resources are free?

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:24 PM

Um, I'm still waiting for THIS MONTHS meaningful content.

October had less new content than we would like to have provided, you are absolutely spot-on there. The launch of Billing unfortunately pulled resources away from live.

November will have considerably more new content than October, as will December.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:29 PM

"You'll be able to purchase the level 1 through 6 versions from vendors, and there may be other ways to acquire them as well."

This does not mention level 7 spells anywhere. Was this left out or are we to assume no level 7 Salvaging Spell?

Apologies, the wording is unclear. There will be level 7 Salvaging spells, but like all level 7 spells you will not be able to purchase them from vendors.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:31 PM

war casting critters are not in need of a nerf.

the ability for a group of chain casting baddies to actually bring a player closer to death is a good thing, as it leads toward increased player skill.

if anything, increase the rewards on these creature.

how?

add a new slot to the loot they drop, and make sure the chance of that loot being pyreal currency is zero.

Increasing the rewards on some of these creatures is one of the options we're looking at. It'll be determined on a case-by-case basis.

Unfortunately I'm fairly certain that the specific suggestion you describe isn't doable with our treasure system.

Aztek

10-28-2004, 03:31 PM

"Unfortunately it was necessary to tweak the Bows down very slightly in order to meet our goals"

Uhhmmm what?

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:32 PM

IBN, i know you'd prefer it if all us pesky little melees would fall off the end of Dereth, but can you respond to the question please. What's happening with the balance issue?

I'm sorry, you'll have to be more specific. Folks talk about balance issues all the time, what do you feel is "the" balance issue?

Myk

10-28-2004, 03:33 PM

IBN,

Could you please read and resond to my post on PvP missile weapons.

Mr_Fred

10-28-2004, 03:37 PM

I said it before. I'll say it again.

Patches where you nerf, lower the morale of your players.

I'd like to see a little counter at the top of our screens..maybe in the character panel where it shows you all your dates/times/resistances. Make it say: "# of Patches since nerf." Sorta like an "Days since an accident" counter at a job site.

Acceptable: Less content to make room for new billing.

Unacceptable: Nerfing the crap out of an amazing game.

Acceptable: Adjusting weapons, tweaking them until you get them just right for PVP and PVM.

Unacceptable: Nerfing, un-nerfing and re-nerfing month after month for PvP.

Solution: Can we say, "Shadowclaim?" Want to test a set of new PvP rules? "FIX" it there please. :D

Either way, unfortunately, I'm hooked on this game till it goes *poof* like a fart in the wind. You can quote me on that one by the way.

Oh and PS:

When I talk about nerfing...there IS an acceptable nerf. When something is going to ruin the game because it's way over powered...by all means, nerf it into oblivion. :p

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:37 PM

DadgaSilverhand

10-28-2004, 03:39 PM

huh? what? another few more months having to "force to deal with" creatures's warspells high damages.
here, i think it may help those want very challenged creatures, a thicker spawn nest (possiblity a static spot) or dungeon tunings but never, Never use that for quest dungeons, it just fine enough for fellowships and less lag or no lag is better for "data streams" exchange during keyboard commands responding.
for those dont like "too much" damage chain-casting, or unbalanced, go explore and search for new hunting spot where it doesnt use much spell attacks or annoying creature's self-healings too often or drainings.

now i see more delays on new higher wield requirement weapon are not sheduled for planned dec's patch, hm thanks alot, but it does give me an excuse to have time to collect several more "useless" salvage bags and make my mules overflowed with bags waiting for uber weapons in months.

Casino move closer? that sound great, Sho and Gharu casino are way too far off except using the casino gems, mostly i used Holtberg, it is shorter run than other 2. it is harder when there are +40 lvl creatures just off the edge of Holtberg casino's landblock lurking.
1.2 mill xp, yeah, been there, done quite few times with rerolls, it like a mountian dew ads. raising with 1.2 mill xp from lvl 5 to lvl 20, but it take roughly 2-3 hours to clear of tokens, then clearing the tropheys, and stuck with large mnemosyne when cant enter unless you also hit lvl 30 or make a choice to get dispell gems, but really worth it, i earned 180 d-notes with them.

No masks! it just like i said few months ago, still got bad feeling for this oct, and this Nov may not get it, but scarecrows spawning in Dec??? what this? Nightmare on Christmas Night 2? or been watching "Silent Night" horror movie too much.
yeah, let me go get some popcorns for Dec's patch. i do hope to see Dec's Teaser shots, which holidays?
Too bad, that Haunted Mansion didnt get a new twists. i do hope they get a breath of new life for that place beside getting an evil couch next year. i hope it is Bruce Campbell's Evil Dead theme, an npc guy with "axe' for a hand.

i do remembered an old Jessica's letter back in early months of 2004 (jan and feb) and thier projects is taking longer than what they thought it would take in few months, but it extend months into nearly a year long.
i knew the teamworks and resources were split for expansion, billings, server transfering, hardwares, and 3rd party services had made the year of 2004 pretty suffering and rough, i do hope this time with the year 2005 will look better when all this transations are done within a few months. so next year's contents will make alot of impact with Viamontians story arc.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:39 PM

IBN,

Could you please read and resond to my post on PvP missile weapons.

Those are good suggestions, I'll pass them on to the team and start doing more ressearch on them.

Marius of FF

10-28-2004, 03:48 PM

SO Turbine finds it "A-oK" to leave overpower/under rewarding spell casters in the game a few extra months?

What the hell? If they gave all Mobs the same % increase in melee damage as they did in spell damage, there would be riots from all the mages and Turbine would have it fixed after 2 days.

Imagine mages crying if Devestators got a 50% bonus to melee damage. It would be nerfed in a Hoxfix on Patchday.

I love this game, but this sucks. Plain and simple. I'm sorry I can't think of a kinder way to say it. But this sucks.

Tell you what, if you want me to, I'll go and test EVERY single critter in the game and write a detailed report as to if it's overpowered or not. I'm serious. I want to help this game, not watch it go to crap.

All I need is a PM with what you want to know and I'll start testing.

Artemius

10-28-2004, 03:51 PM

The LttP does not discuss new content. It never has. There's no way to judge the amount of new content from the LttP.

While I know this is true and I have quoted this in more than a few occasions myself on people complaining about "OMG NO CONTENT!!!11", I'd still like one thing clarified about this.

The mask/guises are now getting pushed back into December. Yet we know for a fact that their art (model/textures/icons) is already downloaded into the client, Scenario himself said so. It seems like a small enough change to integrate the items into the monster loot/trophy tables. I could understand if QA was still testing the new billing system thus not being able to certify all these little changes that might amount to big QA time, yet seems there was no undue testing this month from what the lttp said. Why did they got pushed back to Dec then?

Oh and on a sidenote, would it be possible to turn on the old maks/guises dropping chances for this event? :)

Vlad Morbius

10-28-2004, 03:51 PM

I'm sorry, you'll have to be more specific. Folks talk about balance issues all the time, what do you feel is "the" balance issue?

Tell me you're kidding , please! There's a 36 page post that even you commented on! Remember this:

"I want to let folks know that I have been reading this thread -- I don't have a good response right now because the team doesn't. We are aware of the perceived problem and have had discussions on the best way to resolve it, but there are no specific plans and no ETA.

Obviously, there isn't a quick fix that doesn't unbalance another aspect of the game. Making everyone happy here is going to take a lot of thought and work."

And....this
"AL levels on high-level content are something we have said we are going to investigate, but I do not have a specific ETA on when we will be able to do this.
__________________
Alex "Ibn" Beckers
AC1 Online Community Relations

Please, if there are no plans to fix this fine, but don't tell me you aren't aware of the issue, because if you're not then you aren't doing your job!

This issue has been brought to the forefront for months now, and if this is any indication of how lightly it's being taken , then i guess i've got my answer and so does my group!

PS. Ban me if you like, frankly i don't much care anymore! "Powered by our fans" my butt!

ShaRhee

10-28-2004, 03:53 PM

... But rest assured that there is a LOT of content going into November in addition to what's mentioned in the LttP. This content will be fun for ALL players, whether or not it directly impacts your PK status.

For those who are complaining about the lack of content, if I understand correctly, the LTTP doesn't address content. Turbine has been adding content every month, and I, for one, have really enjoyed the Blackmire quests.

I don't understand why people are so upset about not having masks in October...they'll be here soon, keep your pants on! :) What difference does it make when it is put ingame?

Furthermore, I would rather the billing migration be done "right" rather than "fast" if there is one chance in a million that something could get screwed up in the process. There are probably a thousand ways it could get screwed up, so I think we should be thanking Turbine for taking their time to get it right the first time.

Kudos on the Salvaging spells, it will be nice to finally use that new skill. I am glad to see the monster Creature War spells in the future plans, it's nasty out there in some places! :)

I look forward to seeing what changes are made to the towns to bring people to them, and I like the casinos being moved closer to towns.

Gouru

10-28-2004, 03:55 PM

Tell me you're kidding , please! There's a 36 page post that even you commented on! Remember this:

"I want to let folks know that I have been reading this thread -- I don't have a good response right now because the team doesn't. We are aware of the perceived problem and have had discussions on the best way to resolve it, but there are no specific plans and no ETA.

Obviously, there isn't a quick fix that doesn't unbalance another aspect of the game. Making everyone happy here is going to take a lot of thought and work."

And....this
"AL levels on high-level content are something we have said we are going to investigate, but I do not have a specific ETA on when we will be able to do this.
__________________
Alex "Ibn" Beckers
AC1 Online Community Relations

Please, if there are no plans to fix this fine, but don't tell me you aren't aware of the issue, because if you're not then you aren't doing your job!

This issue has been brought to the forefront for months now, and if this is any indication of how lightly it's being taken , then i guess i've got my answer and so does my group!

I personally think the primary issue is ability to read. There are obviously MULTIPLE balance issues. The question asked about 'THE' balance issue, and Ibn asked for clarification of which the poster considered to be 'THE' issue.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:56 PM

Ah, you're referring to the high-level Imperil/AL discussion. Unfortunately there is no new status on that topic. We know it's an issue, but it's such a large issue that we can't tackle it until we've got a nice big gap in our schedule that we can fill by working on this.

Vlad, please understand that there are many very long threads that I participate in. I try to associate individual names with specific threads when I can, but I don't have photographic memory. (Still waiting on that cyborg brain!)

Lokania

10-28-2004, 03:57 PM

Considering the last post, I will edit my flabbergasted response.

Scenario

10-28-2004, 03:57 PM

The mask/guises are now getting pushed back into December. Yet we know for a fact that their art (model/textures/icons) is already downloaded into the client, Scenario himself said so. It seems like a small enough change to integrate the items into the monster loot/trophy tables. I could understand if QA was still testing the new billing system thus not being able to certify all these little changes that might amount to big QA time, yet seems there was no undue testing this month from what the lttp said. Why did they got pushed back to Dec then?

Giving art to items and finding the time to properly implement them are two different matters. My schedule allowed me to produce the art for them, however content and testing schedules did not have time in their schedules to implement and test the items.

Adding art is easy. Making sure the items the art is tied to work and are properly implemented is a different matter.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 03:58 PM

The mask/guises are now getting pushed back into December. Yet we know for a fact that their art (model/textures/icons) is already downloaded into the client, Scenario himself said so. It seems like a small enough change to integrate the items into the monster loot/trophy tables.

It may seem that way to an outside observer, but it is not a small change.

Oh and on a sidenote, would it be possible to turn on the old maks/guises dropping chances for this event? :)

That's always been our plan, that's one of the reasons why it's not a small change.

In addition -- since I know someone will ask and this probably should've been stated explicitly in the LttP -- it'll be easier to find scarecrows this year. They will spawn in many more areas of Dereth.

turnstyles

10-28-2004, 04:04 PM

personally, i feel if spell casting monsters are going to see their damage potential nerfed, the entire fix to spells should be rolled back.

we all cast the same spells.

no one sees a banderling paragon or a drudge seraph mystic on the boards complaining that he cant get any kills, and chances are, they die many more times than they kill a player.

it just baffles me that players take time out of their lives to complain about pvp balance and charater balance (a worthy topic) then do a complete 180 and complain about one aspect of the game becoming *slightly* harder then it was a few months back. :confused:

"" it'll be easier to find scarecrows this year. They will spawn in many more areas of Dereth.""

score!

Ibn

10-28-2004, 04:05 PM

I don't understand why people are so upset about not having masks in October...they'll be here soon, keep your pants on! :) What difference does it make when it is put ingame?

In the defense of those who are unhappy about this, I understand exactly why they are upset. Many players like to have in-game events associated with Halloween, heck I was a tour guide for the "Haunted Yanshi" event a few years back before I got hired at Turbine. It's a lot easier to have these events if there are new masks or guises and if the existing ones are dropping off creatures for a few weeks ahead of time.

I do sympathize, we all do. I have a full collection of The Simpsons Burger King Halloween figures lining my cube walls, if you'd asked me what I would think if they did another run in December, I wouldn't be happy about it.

But when we were looking at our October and November schedules, knowing that we had to cut things out, masks and guises unfortunately ended up being what got cut. We're definitely not happy about it, we really wanted to get these in for October.

Chrono

10-28-2004, 04:09 PM

The slayer mod on the missile weapons went down about 3%, and the damage mods on the Crossbow and Atlatl went up about 20%.

The ability to give the arrow speed increase to loot bows is something we are likely to do in the future when resources are free.

No offense Ibn, I have all the respect in the world for you but: if the slayer mod was reduced, how the hell does DoT on bows increase?

Arch Magi

10-28-2004, 04:19 PM

personally, i feel if spell casting monsters are going to see their damage potential nerfed, the entire fix to spells should be rolled back.

we all cast the same spells.

no one sees a banderling paragon or a drudge seraph mystic on the boards complaining that he cant get any kills, and chances are, they die many more times than they kill a player.

Doesn't matter to me, but then again, my Mage is level 183, has Max Focus/Self/Magic Defense (Spec'd) and 1 point away from max War (Spec'd). As for the person talking about upping Devestator damage, go for it, that is my my Mage also has a 100 base Coord, and Melee Defense trained, and uses a +40% buffed CS caster so I have an effective Melee Defense of over 700.

:p

Hell, I solo OP in a Swarthy Robe when I'm looking for a "Magical Challenge".

Vlad Morbius

10-28-2004, 04:19 PM

Thanks for the response.

Hopeslayer

10-28-2004, 04:24 PM

Just wondering if anyone of the bow people on other servers have noticed since the speed of flight was uped in the patch,..

On low speed most of the archers on WE all notice that you get stuck in a spot alot. kind of like when you get stuck in a spell when you run into it sometimes.

As for the bow changes, if the DOT is uped on them it might be ok, i know crits were what really helped since mages just run way around to heal. But will have to wait to see.

As for the other weapons.. you say you want to make the melee weapons differ but be ballenced.. problem is people will still go to the one that is Best. so if you try to make them all really close to same then you will have a better spread.

I know ID LOVE to be able to use my staff in pk..And i mean on a non Gharu char. But its damage sucks so i have to use another weapon.
(im sho Race but i hunt and have spec Staff) so i have to use UA when pk.
************************************************** *******

ok just wondering if we will ever see things like the ones in VoD in dungens.
I know the Gromnies would be cool in a dungen. and would be nice in a closed space when it comes to xp. Only problem would be you would have to find a way to make it Macro unfriendly while keeping it fun. (and i use Gromnies as examples cause there not somthing that vuns 5000 times) you could do like the traps in the tusker place if you really wanted somthing like that.

MisatoX

10-28-2004, 04:25 PM

So is there not a lv VII buff for salvaging next patch?

Paraduck

10-28-2004, 04:34 PM

Hehe, the "Powered by the Kukuur" is a nice touch. :)

It looks to be an interesting month for players, regardless of their PK status. However, I would have provided a damage table for the PK weapons changes (Old vs. New damage.) Having it generalized in sentences is nice, but I feel that some of us would like to see the numbers as well. It won't be the same as playing with the changes -- nothing can top that -- but in these cases I think the more information the better.

turnstyles

10-28-2004, 04:37 PM

""In November, you will be able to acquire spells to increase the Salvaging skill. You'll be able to purchase the level 1 through 6 versions from vendors, and there may be other ways to acquire them as well.""

level 7's will be found in loot gen and chests im guessing,

and arch: im with you %100. i hunt on the OP in the sirraluun dress :)

Zaerik-MT

10-28-2004, 04:37 PM

Will we only recieve the gift in november? or can we log in, in like december without once having logged in, in november and still be able to get the item?

Frank The Knife

10-28-2004, 04:42 PM

MisatoX

10-28-2004, 04:47 PM

""In November, you will be able to acquire spells to increase the Salvaging skill. You'll be able to purchase the level 1 through 6 versions from vendors, and there may be other ways to acquire them as well.""

level 7's will be found in loot gen and chests im guessing,

Sounds like the last part is referencing the 1-6 scrolls. Would like clarification :)

Jet-eye-nite

10-28-2004, 04:58 PM

1.I see you still wrestle with getting away from the zone, as no mention when the vast majority of us will be able to do this (don't mis-understand I applaud your efforts thus far,but Big J said early summer, it fall now ).
2.I see more on pvp and I wonder what ratio of players are pvp vs pvm ?
3.I see no tinkering advancement in concept, is this really low on the pole ?
I could fill volumes of what tinkering could be .
4.Town upgrade for noobs ? Why not town upgrades for veteran ?
5.Are you adding salvage skill items into loot system other than just a +40 max scroll ?
6.I see no mention of this xp exploit being fixed ?
7.I still wonder if loot will ever be right ,the progression of diffuculty doesn't hold true in many cases I have found .
8.No masks till xmas, argh
For me it sounds as boring as Oct.

Chrono

10-28-2004, 05:02 PM

4.Town upgrade for noobs ? Why not town upgrades for veteran ?

I don't think that was meant as a sweeping statement. I think he meant that the noob areas of those towns would be upgraded along with the other additions to them, and there's no harm in that,

Flipo

10-28-2004, 05:15 PM

masks and guises : Well Oct/Nov is history. Was thinking maybe Snowman and/or Santa Outfit would be an entertaining fit for Dec.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 05:18 PM

ok just wondering if we will ever see things like the ones in VoD in dungens.

Yes, you will, in the near future.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 05:19 PM

Will we only recieve the gift in november? or can we log in, in like december without once having logged in, in november and still be able to get the item?

You will receive the gift the first time you log in after the November event, no matter how much time passes.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 05:20 PM

level 7's will be found in loot gen and chests im guessing,

Mmm... not exactly.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 05:26 PM

6.I see no mention of this xp exploit being fixed ?

I'm not sure what you're referring to. There were rumors of an XP exploit earlier this month, we investigated and asked multiple times for specific information, but it was never provided and we haven't found anything. Currently I don't have any reason to believe that it is not a hoax, similar to the "infinite XP" exploit hoax when we did the first rollback recompense on Darktide.

If you have more specific information on this, please PM me or email me.

Mestivious

10-28-2004, 05:26 PM

please don't make it a part of the BM quests.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 05:27 PM

I think he meant that the noob areas of those towns would be upgraded along with the other additions to them

You are correct.

Gouru

10-28-2004, 05:29 PM

Chrono

10-28-2004, 05:33 PM

Ibn, I would still like my question answered :)

How does reducing a slayer mod increase DoT on a bow?

Paraduck

10-28-2004, 05:37 PM

IMHO, it's the noob towns I'd MOST like to see with added draws to get players visiting them.

I think forward to a future when real live new players join the game. When they work their way into town from the training center, it would be great for them to find <gasp> REAL people. And I'd go one step further, make the draws for Holtburg appeal to aluvians, shoushi to Sho's and Yaraq to Ghu, so that all 3 of the noobie towns would have a population.Agreed. Could towns in general use a touch up? Absolutely. But start low and work your way up. Making the newbie experience fun and retaining players is what counts. If a new player has a bad experience and tells their friends, wouldn't their friends be less likely to try the game?

I think at higher levels, continuing to add content -- quests, hunting grounds, and the like -- will be fine for a while. It sounds like there's plans to address this in the expansion and with the elder game too. There's a lot of high level players that can band together for those things, and seems to be what's frequently requested anyway.

turnstyles

10-28-2004, 05:53 PM

Mmm... not exactly.

long, drawn out quest! long, drawn out quest!

DarkEdge

10-28-2004, 05:59 PM

Well if you ask me Turbine killed the towns with the many Buy/Sale rate changes. Look Candeth Keep is great, but the only reason people are there is to sell. I don't want to kill the population at candeth so maybe give us a slightly better sale rate there like 5%, and then give the capital towns the 100% sellback rate, and then give us the same buy rate master mages get.

The casino move is great, but that isnt enough on its own to bring life back into the towns. You have to make towns have the ability to bring players back every day 1-2 times like Candeth has the ability too. Move trophy and crafter npcs to the capital towns also.

This has been mentioned before, but give towns a Tinkering bonus so people will go there to do there tinking. People are always looking to talk, show off, and lend helping hands about there tinking skills.

If you guys implement any of these changes I want a weather vain of my toon put on the buildings in the capital cities. :p j/k but not really, that would be cool as hell.

P.S. Put in a rather large mana pool for bots. While we can talk later about the details and the % bonus to recharge rate, this would get people going there not only to buff everyonce and awhile, but many noobs there to buff up and converse.

Ibn

10-28-2004, 06:03 PM

How does reducing a slayer mod increase DoT on a bow?

I'm confused, DoT on the Weeping Bow did not get increased.

Blau

10-28-2004, 06:07 PM

You're decreasing bow critical damage for weeping weapons???

Are you insane???

Bow wasn't broken! Killing PKs is ALL ABOUT CRITS! You must seriously reconsider this change. Archers are ALREADY 3rd-class citizens. Why make it worse?

Edit: Ibn - here's what he's referring to. I think he just misread it:

"Bows will do smaller critical hits than Swords in the same class, but have a higher average damage over time."

Edit #2: I'm incensed by this change. This sort of "surprise" was supposed to be prevented by the "coming soon" stuff. You gave us no indication that this was coming - only general "hey - we're changing stuff". If you don't give us time to see the REAL CHANGES and react to them, the whole system is only marginally functional. Why bother telling us if you don't give us the data with which to provide early feedback? This change is COMPLETELY unnecessary and archers on Darktide don't really stand much of a chance as it is already.

Chrono

10-28-2004, 06:11 PM

I'm confused, DoT on the Weeping Bow did not get increased.

Unfortunately it was necessary to tweak the Bows down very slightly in order to meet our goals. Bows will do smaller critical hits than Swords in the same class, but have a higher average damage over time.

Wait does this mean Bow will have a higher DoT than sword? It wasn't very clear.

Really though, us bow guys can't even HIT anything, why hurt our damage anymore? Why? Please answer, we would LOVE to know. WHY? IT makes ZERO sense whatsoever unless you just made bow ammo instant hit. As said above, we are third class citizens, we can't hit CRAP. If anything our damage should be increased. I'm sorry but this is the first time in a very, very long time when I can actually say I'm truly disappointed in a Turbine decision.. really dropped the ball here, you should change it back while you still can because that's insane.

.Kid.

10-28-2004, 06:26 PM

Hmmm I bet if theres a new *hint* quests *hint* then there SHOULD be one for killing Reeshan! Woo

I've been waiting to kill him!

I'm kinda confused on the 'Bow Speed' issue...Hollow and Phantom Bow have been greatly overpowered now but I'm not sure if this touches on that issue. I've seen bowers hit me for 30's at the highest speed possible with just a plain hollow bow! My armor is tinked up pretty good too. It only takes them 10 hits (or a little more or less)...this isn't very fair for mages. I'm thinking about training missle on Kid.

And to testify that, I even went on my level 115 bower, using high speed, and I killed some pretty darn good mages (skill wise).

Other than that, I love the Burun story (as of now).

Keep up the good work Turbine :D

Anaximander

10-28-2004, 06:41 PM

Finishing Item magic buffing improvements didn't make it on the list.

Chrono

10-28-2004, 06:47 PM

What more item buff improvements?

Neue Regel

10-28-2004, 06:48 PM

I like the idea of moving the casinos closer to towns. But, please fix the golden chests. I used 100 MMD's last night and got 3 GGromnies and 17 Golden Keys from 32 pack scarecrows. From the 17 keys, I got junk, not one good item. I have leveled 5 mules in the last week using this method so I didnt actually get nothing, got lots of newby xp, but some nice loot would have been nice after spending 500 MMDs over the last week alone. I have used 52 keys on the golden chests in the last week and only a few good items. a few DI's and one work 4 22-40 sword. Two majors that quickly went to the floor. I get much better loot from the VoD chests and I am not paying for them.

Blau

10-28-2004, 07:12 PM

How can you even talk about quests??? They're nerfing bow without an ounce of justification.

Ah... but thank god... we have a new monster that might spawn another quest. Maybe it'll be as good as the last one where there were like 200 mobs and only someone with a 32-processor supercomputer doesn't lag all the way to the lifestone.

Oh! The humanity!

DarkEdge

10-28-2004, 07:14 PM

-Kaxak-

10-28-2004, 07:41 PM

Nurf , Nurf , and more Nurf , oh wait a bump for sword , why is this ? oh ya now I remember over 3/4 of all servers only have players that can play sword because Mage is too hard .......... :rolleyes:

about the nurfs in PvP , if you people would use a TEST server for new and old weapons it would sure help to keep you people from looking like total morons everytime a new patch comes out .......... just a thought :rolleyes:

Yawn , once again Major lack in content is all I see in the LTTP :eek:

w0w :)

DarkEdge

10-28-2004, 07:43 PM

kristov

10-28-2004, 07:57 PM

Well Ibn, it appears that you guys only cater to the whinngs of mages in pvp.
After the advent of the changes to phantom/hollow ua, I finally had a chance to be able to go 1 on 1 with mages and actually win here and there.

Nerfing ua's,swords,bows,etc and once again giving mages the upper hand again in pvp only forces people not to want to pvp. Just because war magic is more expensive credit wise shouldn't be the deciding factor for war magic as the " be all end all" for pvp. War magic is already stronger damage wise in pvp than any other skill. Nerfing the melee/missle weapons only increases the chances for mages to win unless you have a lvl 180+ melee/missle toon with maxed skills.

I have several toons in the 160+ range with 2 in the 180+ range and the mages are always stronger in pvp than any other toon I have. It finally seemed to be a level playing field with melee/missle vs mage in pvp up to this point. I can't say i agree with nerfing melee/missle weapons is the fix.

_b0o

10-28-2004, 08:07 PM

I would like to thank Turbine for this patch! Been waiting for some PvP fixes for a long time. and glad some attention has been turned towards them. As to the players "upset that the devs are spending so much time on PvP", whatever, we've waited for some fixes patiently for MONTHS. PvP takes a backburner to pretty much everything else in this game.

I'm also glad Turbine is being cautious with the billing migration, the cluster-fudge that was the zone changes a few years ago was bad, so even though I dislike using the zone, I'd rather use it a little longer and wait for a working Turbine system, then a quick hashed together system.

I'm also confident we will have a good patch in Novemeber with content, the LTTP has never been a source of spoilers or teaser information, so don't see why people are getting all worked up over it now.

Thank you Turbine! Keep up the good work.

edit:

Well Ibn, it appears that you guys only cater to the whinngs of mages in pvp.
After the advent of the changes to phantom/hollow ua, I finally had a chance to be able to go 1 on 1 with mages and actually win here and there.

Nerfing ua's,swords,bows,etc and once again giving mages the upper hand again in pvp only forces people not to want to pvp. Just because war magic is more expensive credit wise shouldn't be the deciding factor for war magic as the " be all end all" for pvp. War magic is already stronger damage wise in pvp than any other skill. Nerfing the melee/missle weapons only increases the chances for mages to win unless you have a lvl 180+ melee/missle toon with maxed skills.

I have several toons in the 160+ range with 2 in the 180+ range and the mages are always stronger in pvp than any other toon I have. It finally seemed to be a level playing field with melee/missle vs mage in pvp up to this point. I can't say i agree with nerfing melee/missle weapons is the fix.

Wow man can you not read? They didn't nerf melee at all. They actually raised the DoT on most melee weapons and x-bow/thrown, the only "nerf" was to the Phantom Katar, which was out damaging every other melee weapon even sword and NEEDED to be nerfed. And only thing nerfed about bow was the EXPLOIT, heavens forbid they fix an exploit! They did not nerf bow.

I'm a swordsman and I am eager to see how this all turns out, to see if I can town crier theses gems that I was going to use to change to UA(I'M GHARU!). I am glad they are balancing the melee weapons so that sword is back on top, where it should be.

JJC

10-28-2004, 08:09 PM

> Ah, you're referring to the high-level Imperil/AL discussion. Unfortunately there is no new status on that topic. We know it's an issue, but it's such a large issue that we can't tackle it until we've got a nice big gap in our schedule that we can fill by working on this.

You will never find that gap by waiting for it. Also, until you define that problem as you understand it you can never expect us to know that you have an understanding of the problem. I also would question the desire to tackle the issue since there is no signs of being near the ball. It's even worse that Deion since you picked the anology.

JJC

Chrono

10-28-2004, 08:16 PM

They did not nerf bow.

Yes they did.

Unfortunately it was necessary to tweak the Bows down very slightly in order to meet our goals.

It's only like 3% but the very fact they did it at all just irritates the hell out of me. I wouldn't mind it if they fixed our tracking at the same time. *cough*

Paraduck

10-28-2004, 08:24 PM

Well Ibn, it appears that you guys only cater to the whinngs of mages in pvp.
After the advent of the changes to phantom/hollow ua, I finally had a chance to be able to go 1 on 1 with mages and actually win here and there.I believe the issue here is the power for the skill credit cost compared to other weapons -- not the fact to give mages another advantage.

Nerfing ua's,swords,bows,etc and once again giving mages the upper hand again in pvp only forces people not to want to pvp. Just because war magic is more expensive credit wise shouldn't be the deciding factor for war magic as the " be all end all" for pvp.Sword wasn't nerfed again. It just isn't back to where it once was.

Dj_Viper

10-28-2004, 09:17 PM

Thank you Turbine for the PvP fixes! I will re-activate my melee account for a month to see how it works.

The only problem I might see is the phantom katar still, you said it's being lowered to equal the other classes. Does this mean that it will now do the same damage as other classes, or a lot less because it swings faster. I hope it's weaker because it costs less, people should have to spend the extra credits to get higher damage.

Sprawl

10-28-2004, 09:21 PM

I understand the purpose of the lttp is the give current players an early chance to see what will change in the upcoming month. However I think it is bad management to have this be the forerunning document for each months events. The teaser makes more sense to me as the first document for each event, then followed with the lttp. Minor change but I think it would help these people and their cries of "no content" when you don't introduce each patch with a "list of nerf/loves/tweaks".

:x

Sprawl

Dom on TD

10-28-2004, 09:26 PM

"In September we increased War Magic Bolt and Arc damage at levels 1-6, and Streaks at levels 1-7, for the purposes of increasing War Magic damage at lower levels. This also made a number of creatures significantly more dangerous, as their War spells also did more damage.

We've received a lot of negative feedback regarding this "side-effect", but also a lot of positive feedback. Many players are upset that they cannot survive in their old hunting grounds; many players are excited by the increased challenge.

What we would like to do is to examine war-casting creatures on a case-by-case basis to determine if their risk is still acceptable compared to their reward, and if not, whether the risk or the reward should be changed. Unfortunately our schedule will not permit us to do this for some time.

We currently expect to begin adjusting creatures in groups starting in the next few months, be sure to watch future Letters to the Players for future updates. We're committed to making sure that creature risk is worth the reward, but we also do not want to rob players of an enjoyable challenge."

So what you're saying is, stick to dungeons with only bugs or tuskers if I don't have magic def spec'd? Great. Thx for nuthin. How can it be worth my while to die trying to kill a wisp or a Diamond Golem?

Shaolin_Sam

10-28-2004, 10:07 PM

Looks GREAT, Turbine! I'm really looking forward to November and... It looks like next year is going to be fun :)

As usual, Ibn... Ignore the people that are strictly whining. Great job explaining, and expanding on, the questions from the people being mature during their questioning.

Regardless of what the SMALL MINORITY of whining players are saying, you guys are doing great :)

MisatoX

10-28-2004, 10:46 PM

Mmm... not exactly.

Thanks for the hint :) I'm guessing there's some kind of quest for the scroll since you're trying to keep quiet here ;)

Hungwell

10-28-2004, 11:02 PM

Well, in all honesty I have stuck by you guys for almost 5 years. I started this game in Dec. 99. I have been thru the bad patches the lag the roll backs and every other mistake that has been made by devs past and present. I have stuck with this game because it makes sense most of the time.

I am extreemly disappointed in this lttp. You speak of balanced pvp and all that is mentioned is melee and missile. IMHO if you polled the players not a damned one of us would care. UA is a bit over powered true but does anyone care about the traditional flavor of mace vs axe? uhhhhh NO.

What I care about in pvp is the fact that a mage with a third the xp of my archer can kill me with 3 spells. The total inbalance between mage and melee/archer slip your minds? If what you have mentioned is the only thing done in November for pvp balance then you have surely missed the mark 100%. I am simply amazed at the blind eye that is continually turned to the real imbalance in this game. What you are doing with pvp in this patch is the equivalent of worrying about a tail light being out on a car that is totally wrecked.

And omg you are fixing the rapid fire bow bug? Does every dev play a mage? You bust your butts fixing something that comes into play only on rare occasions and ignore slide cast and hold casting? Once again the mage comes out on top. But oh yeah we popped a cap in that nasty bow exploit.

gimme a break.

I am one disgruntled customer right now.

Furcifer

10-28-2004, 11:12 PM

I have just a quick question about this....
"These weapons receive a smaller damage bonus from Strength than other weapons, but at high levels the total damage bonus is still quite considerable."

Do daggers receive damage bonuses from strength, coordination, quickness, your dagger skill, or any combination of these? I always thought, for some reason, that everyone got a damage bonus with the skill of their weapon... I didn't know it was based off of stats. It'll be kind of dissapointing to find out that I need to raise my strength to do more damage with my dagger, as the only reason I had to raise it before was for pack space =-\ I also heared the reason meleers crit more than mages is because meleers have higher strength... I have no idea if this is true or not.

Anyway... the patch seems like it's going to be good! I was a bit disapointed that there were no masks for halloween, but the salvaging changes kind of made up for that for me hehe. I actually salvage now :-P before, it was kind of a pain.

Also.... and I know this is way beyond wishfull thinking and is probably unfeasable... but are there possibly any plans to add special attacks to meleers, such as area attacks? Kind of like ring spells for mages. Maybe certain weapons could have that, just like daggers and swords have multi-strike. It's annoying to be in the middle of a bunch of level 1 monsters and have to hit each one individually, when I feel like I should be able to mow them all down =-P Maybe special weapons could do it, like if you had the damage all the way up like you have to do for multi-strikes? It'd be cool if, eventually, each weapon had some sort of special attack or ability associated with it... right now sword, dagger, and to some extent UA, are the only ones like that. Also.... how come monsters can cast spells with a melee weapon out, but I can't >_< Gaaaah! I'm jealous =-P

Apollo

10-29-2004, 12:06 AM

I don't want to sound dumb, but it could be unavoidable, who knows? :p

Ibn, why don't we get our usually annual October masks? :confused: After reading all the changes for October they were really the only thing that interested me. Not to say the other things weren't helpful and good, they usually are. But this month I didn't need Salvage skill so I wanted to get the newest masks of '04! But instead spent way too much time searchin for them in the game, and then found out they didn't exist yet? :(

The icons were created, the monsters to drop them might have been too. But you guys didn't have the resources to add them into the monster loot? Just wondering what happened, a little more than "lack of resources."

Thanks Ibn!
Now I'm excited for December. :p

auberon

10-29-2004, 12:08 AM

Wow.
I have been playing since open beta.
In all that time I have never seen a BRUSH OFF
quite like this one

I'm sorry, you'll have to be more specific. Folks talk about balance issues all the time, what do you feel is "the" balance issue?

I mean OH MY GAWD does turbine/ibn really think that the collective intelligence of their players is so pathetically low that they can issue statements like this.

I would have expected a reasonably well thought out and articulated response
to what has become possibly the greatest issue in this game, NOT a juvenile knee jerk reaction.

For five and a half years I have watched post after post on every board out there. Posts that have explained in painstaking detail how and why mages have such a clear advantage. Posts that list in detail issue after issue with game imbalance.

I have seen game content change to reduce xp generated in a location where mage only fellowships were created and melee characters were harrased for hunting there.

Despite all of this IBN has the temerity to simply brush us off?

Time to think again about that expansion pack if this is the support we are getting.

Aub

SpiritCat

10-29-2004, 12:09 AM

The idea of introducing the salvaging skill was great, but its severely flawed. It cost way more exp into the salvaging skill to get max salvage than it does with any other tinkering skill due to them being based on attributes. This means that it is still best advised to be race G. Either start us with a higher base salvaging skill or base it on some attributes, or lower the skill check to get 100 % salvage. When salvaging came out I dropped item tinkering and put all that exp(plus an additional 20 million exp) into salvaging and when I salvaged a work 7 item I only got 5 units. That is unacceptable to me.

Btw I'm sorry if this was already posted.

SC

Litar

10-29-2004, 12:10 AM

Loot-generated weapons aren't currently feasible in most PvP combat.
166% AR bows were quite feasible until Hollow Bows turned out to do equal damage. What's the point in tinkering up a bow anymore?

_b0o

10-29-2004, 12:41 AM

Melee VS Mage was actually almost 'right' when weepings were first added but sword was a little 'over the top'

their changes after that made more of an imbalance than before.

they seem to be trying to get back near that balance.

increasing bow damage *could* fix mage vs archer, but it would screw over melee vs archer, u try to fight a archer and have low/no missle d as a melee? u die, very very fast to full speed or half speed arrows jammed in ur face. increasing archer damage any more would imbalance melee vs archer more

the heart of the mage vs archer problem is not to make archers like mages(heavy hitters) but to fix the pathing of arrows to be 'semi-seeking'.

i play pretty much melee and archer characters and pvp pretty much most of the time im IG. after this patch i think melee vs mage will be where it should be.

archer vs mage needs a fix and that will not be easily done as changing item stats isnt the answer ,theyd have to change the pathing of arrows

archer vs melee needs a fix too, w/o missle defense a melee will get shredded. they need to implement that idea of weeping only being partially shield hollow

or go ahead and up archer damage a good amount, and make missle weepings 50% shield hollow

Arch Magi

10-29-2004, 12:49 AM

Renegade54

10-29-2004, 12:49 AM

So what you're saying is, stick to dungeons with only bugs or tuskers if I don't have magic def spec'd? Great. Thx for nuthin. How can it be worth my while to die trying to kill a wisp or a Diamond Golem?I guess I'm a bit confused by this. :confused: I play multiple characters, none with magic d specialized, and none of them have any trouble killing either diamond golems or wisps of any type. One is a mage, currently level 72; two hits with a level 6 bludgeon spell using a bludgeon rend wand, and a diamond golem goes down. His buddies do little or no damage to me, and they go down quickly as well. My level 70 sword and my level 79 UA take a bit more time to dispatch the same critters, but again, I have no problem wading into a spawn of diamond golems and taking them all out, with a few heals along the way. And, I reiterate, I do *NOT* have magic defense specialized, or even boosted to an abnormally high level, in any of these characters. So... I'm not sure why you're having so much trouble. Could you clarify this, please?

Scenario

10-29-2004, 12:50 AM

The icons were created, the monsters to drop them might have been too. But you guys didn't have the resources to add them into the monster loot? Just wondering what happened, a little more than "lack of resources."

As we have said, we wanted to make sure our Billing System got the testing resources it needed. In order to do this, we had to choose things to cut back on until a later time.

Masks and Guises were, unfortunately, cut for October. We don't like having to scale back our ambitions, but we wanted our Billing System to launch as flawlessly as possible, so it was a choice we had to make.

ArcheronLC

10-29-2004, 03:54 AM

kalila

10-29-2004, 04:10 AM

Originally Posted by Dom on TD
So what you're saying is, stick to dungeons with only bugs or tuskers if I don't have magic def spec'd? Great. Thx for nuthin. How can it be worth my while to die trying to kill a wisp or a Diamond Golem?
I guess I'm a bit confused by this. :confused: I play multiple characters, none with magic d specialized, and none of them have any trouble killing either diamond golems or wisps of any type.
.....
So... I'm not sure why you're having so much trouble. Could you clarify this, please?
heheh, I was wondering the same thing. My lvl 60-something archer can take on a diamond golem or a group of gold golems with a trained base magic def of only 179 without any worries. Now, the packs of Elariwood(sp?) golems have me running away still... :D

And to those complaining about content - how many times does Ibn have to say that the lttp does not say much about content?? I'm probly one of the newest players here (started in March) and I knew that. Last month's teasers, etc., didn't have much listed - but there were lots of live events instead. Think mebbe they'll continue that abit??

I've seen alot of posts "give us a content free month in order to fix some things" but there sure are alot of ppl crying about no content just based off the lttp. Come on ppl, did you leave your maturity behind when you got up this morning???

One last rant - read ALL the previous posts before posting!! Ibn and other ppl have answered the same questions already!!! Over and over again.
You suck...

Yet another month of minor patching...
Let's see, you give us crappy monthly patches because everyone is off working on the "expansion pack"? Then you'll ask us to pay for the expansion to get the content and features that you should have just patched in with the monthly updates?
You admit that creatures are unbalanced because you implemented the war magic changes without rebalancing them? Now we get this "It will take quite some time to rebalance the monsters" crap? I bet you could have rebalanced the monsters if you were working on AC instead of the expansion pack...
Did I mention you suck?
rofl - Yet anouther person who didn't read the 'there is NO content in the lttp' the previous 5 times it was posted here. And did you not hear that seperate teams are working on monthly content and the expansion?? And would you really rather they did a blanket change to every monster??? By taking it groups at a time, it'll end up being a much better balancing.

/e slams her head against the wall a couple times.
/e takes a deep breath.

There were some real good posts, with intresting ideas I hope that Turbine keeps in mind. :) Even a couple of good disagreement posts. But omg, there are some whiners. I've been lurking on these boards all summer, it's just been bubbling up inside. :mad:

Yan_HG

10-29-2004, 04:21 AM

If I may make a request- please skip the masks and guises altogether this year. I was ok thinking they'd make it in the game for November because it's still only a couple days away from Halloween. December is too much, though. Unless the masks and guises are snowmen and yeti (plural... I think) it seems way~ out of place. I'd be happier having twice as many new masks for next October than horribly unseasonable masks for December.

If I may make a second request- I'm still holding my breath for information regarding no/low-magic characters balance. It would show some dedication to the issue if you were to include this in the "In Concept" portion of the LttP next month. After all, you always have this disclaimer to fall back on if you never get around to it:

We cannot guarantee when – or even if – any of these changes will be added to the game, as scheduling and priorities can change.

Lord-of-Light

10-29-2004, 04:59 AM

I realize that many of my fellow forum posters probably regard me as a diehard Turnine fanboy, so they may well dismiss this comment from the getgo...

However, as someone who's about as PK-aversive as you can get (and will continue to be so unless/until Turbine decides to introduce a realm vs realm for AC, which is pretty much the only form of PK play I'd ever even begin to consider), I nevertheless regard viable PK/PKL play as being a notable component of AC's continued viability both vis-a-vis the existing subscriber base, and, as or more importantly, in terms of its potential draw for new or returning players...and, as such, as a general rule tend to pay a bit more attention to PK-related issues/the PK forum board here than do many of my fellow non-PK ACers.

Moreover, for me, that general "casual"/"academic" interest was somewhat overridden the last couple of months by the "problems" that were apparently being caused in PK play by UA as PKers using same were reaching ever-higher levels. Although I play a wide variety of chars in AC which collectively utilize virtually every form of attack (except TW) as a primary skill, as well as (in other instances) part of a "suite" of attack skills, UA has always been one of my favorite attack skills (such that SHOs esentially comprise just under 50% of the chars that I play)...and I was very concerned that as a result of the recent ongoing primarily PK-related UA controversy, UA might suffer some sort of fundamental nerf as was being urged by many on these boards (i.e., as a non-PKer, I was very concerned about what course Turbine would take to remedy a PK-related "problem" that they had already acknowledged needed to be addressed).

Thankfully, that did not occur...but was instead addressed in a well-reasoned rational manner as were a couple of other PK-related issues that needed to be addressed as much or more to try to "stabilize" PK/PKL play in AC.

And I fully expect that the Devs will now for the most part turn their focus to other gameplay issues which are not (mostly) PK-focussed over the next few months (although this will, more likely than not, NOT include any early fix for the "life magic-centric" issue that's been the other major topic on these boards...because it's simply not susceptible to a "ready"/easy fix as Turbine has already noted via Ibn.

Nya13

10-29-2004, 07:48 AM

waiting patch day to test... :rolleyes:
(why people cry so much?) :eek:

Mestivious

10-29-2004, 08:49 AM

If you think they suck so much why do you keep paying them?

Frank The Knife

10-29-2004, 10:13 AM

If you think they suck so much why do you keep paying them?

I have already canceled one account and if the weeping changes are not enough its over for AC and me. There are other games out there and I am just sick of having exploits run rampant while nerfs seem to be their only answer.

Winter

10-29-2004, 10:23 AM

Yet another month of minor patching...
Let's see, you give us crappy monthly patches because everyone is off working on the "expansion pack"? Then you'll ask us to pay for the expansion to get the content and features that you should have just patched in with the monthly updates?
You admit that creatures are unbalanced because you implemented the war magic changes without rebalancing them? Now we get this "It will take quite some time to rebalance the monsters" crap? I bet you could have rebalanced the monsters if you were working on AC instead of the expansion pack...

I dont think Arch is talking about in any way the quantity of content going into the patch. I think hes rather refering to the quality of it, and when you look at it and then look at the huge number of things that need to be fixed on the non-caster side, and the monster rebalancing that they set themselves up for, it really paints a bleak picture...but wait were getting an X-pack with lots of new content!

Please, I expect more of the same.

Not only the expansion pack, but the billing and new launcher too. At this point in the game, there is so much that needs to be fixed that they should put the x-pack on hold, otherwise ill predict a mass exodus when new players realize the sad state of affairs that is AC1.

If you think they suck so much why do you keep paying them?

Well I think sucking is a rather strong term, since I know none of them personally, but Im not paying them. I seem to remember Turbine's motto, "Powered by our Fans", and their fans are practically begging them for some things to change, and instead they get blown off; 35 pages of post and our community relations cant seem to formulate an answer, so they take the 'duh' approach by saying "there is no status", or they get 'in concept' articles in the LTTP that disappear, but of course Turbine always has "plausible deniability" because they put their cute little disclaimer in there. I can think of at least four times this has happened. I hate to say it, but I would even be happy with a bi-monthly content schedule so they would have time to start hotfixing these problems gradually between content cycles.

B. Blood

10-29-2004, 10:29 AM

When am I gonna get a washer and dryer for my Cottage?? My Amuli is really starting to get rank and I didnt see a hint about this in the LttP! You know I pay for this game and I think to let me walk around with blood stains on my armor is unforgivable! People are starting to stare!!! Get with it boys!

:eek: :p :D

Hungwell

10-29-2004, 10:42 AM

If you think they suck so much why do you keep paying them?

For me right now the only reason that I am still here is because every new game comming out seems to want to do forced grouping and I play solo most of the time.

I mad a facetious comment about the devs all playing pk mages earlier but I am beginning to wonder if that is not close to the mark. Could the non mages just be trapped in a world being made by self serving devs that play mages? I hope not but it is looking that way.

I personally have 3 accounts in AC1 and am the monarch of one of the 3 largest guilds in the game. So far, all of my internal feedback from guild members on this lttp has been negative.

:(

Silifi Of Death

10-29-2004, 11:27 AM

Well, this is amusing. I haven't seen so much negative posting since ... well, I can't remember when.

Anyway. Ibn, simple question. Turbine must have some number in mind when they deal with the PvP or PvM issue.

What number is that? I mean, what percentage of the total AC population do you think is PvP?

Are you complaining that the patch is about PvP?

The last patch they did anything with PvP was in June. And they screwed up things for PKers, not improve them, or balance them. It's about time they take a little time to focus on the PKs instead of what they always do, focus on NPK.

...Sorry you don't get your bunny masks this month.

Hungwell

10-29-2004, 11:30 AM

Are you complaining that the patch is about PvP?

The last patch they did anything with PvP was in June. And they screwed up things for PKers, not improve them, or balance them. It's about time they take a little time to focus on the PKs instead of what they always do, focus on NPK.

...Sorry you don't get your bunny masks this month.

No mask just ears and tail. This game needs lingerie.

Stith

10-29-2004, 11:36 AM

I have to say that I'm extremely dissapointed in this LttP.

1. PvP Changes: Does anyone at Turbine even play melee PK/L? The Phantom Katar didn't need a nerf - all the other melee weapons needed to be boosted up to the same level. Congratulations, you've just killed the one viable melee PvP weapon.

2. Masks in December: Arg.

3. Monster War damage: When this came out, we told you there was a problem. You said something like, "We'll look into it and balance it soon." Now it's months later and you still have no ETA on your fix? It's time for you to rearrange your priorities. First fix your most recent efferts to ruin the game, by reversing the implementation if necessary, then start fixing other PvM bugs.

4. Imperil/High AL: It's not difficult to come up with ideas for content that would at least band-aid this problem. It looks like you guys aren't even going to be looking at how to come up with a real fix until Summer '05 at the earliest. Once again, you need to get your priorities straight and get basic game balance problems worked out before you think about working on the expansion. But since that isn't going to happen, make a dungeon with magic immune bugs (just set the Magic D impossibly high) that are shield hollow and extremely high damage. Make this dungeon produce Caul/VoD style rewards. Copy the dungeon layout, use old art for the bugs, I don't care. Just get the mechanics in to allow low magic characters a high level hunting spot.

Overall, I'd say Turbine's about a month from seeing all of my accounts canceled, if they continue to ignore all of these problems.

Hungwell

10-29-2004, 12:02 PM

Ibn

10-29-2004, 12:09 PM

Nerfing ua's,swords,bows,etc and once again giving mages the upper hand again in pvp...

Again. DoT and crits on Weeping Sword are going UP. Phantom Sword and Deadly Hollow Sword are not being changed. Where are folks getting this "sword is being nerfed"? It's NOT.

UA: Weeping Claw damage is going up. Deadly Hollow Katar is staying the same. Only the Phantom Katar is going down because it was doing more damage than any other PvP weapon.

Weeping and Phantom Bow DoT is only being decreased a small fraction. Hollow Bow damage is going up.

Eruditus

10-29-2004, 12:10 PM

Masks and guises in December... sorry thats just wrong, or is your intention to put the xmas patch back to June or some such?

Why not just scrap the masks and guises this year and start afresh in 05? Words alone cannot express how unimpressed I am by this LTTP.

Ibn

10-29-2004, 12:12 PM

I mean OH MY GAWD does turbine/ibn really think that the collective intelligence of their players is so pathetically low that they can issue statements like this.

When a player refers to "the balance issue" I have no way of knowing if they are upset about:

Mage/Melee balance
PvP balance
Creature War Magic balance
Quest risk/reward balance
Quest item/loot item balance
Loot balance

...just off the top of my head. All of these are perceived as problems by some group of players.

Once the specific issue was pinned down, you'll note that I gave a specific answer.

Ibn

10-29-2004, 12:15 PM

Of course they do. They just all play mages.

I play a melee on Darktide. Sword, specifically.

_b0o

10-29-2004, 12:16 PM

Where are folks getting this "sword is being nerfed"? It's NOT.

sadly, they are just, well, stupid, and / or cannot read :( forgive them

Hungwell

10-29-2004, 12:30 PM

Ok

Other than telling me "You suck!" Why is it that mages with 1/15th of my xp pwn me in pkl constantly? Why is it that there are virtually no heavy pk/pkl archers on MT?

We run pkl events interguild and guild vs guild about once a month on average. We usually get between 20 and 30 participants. Of these we get 2 high level archers, 1 or two high level swords, and the rest mages. The only non mages that show other than the archers and swords in this list are very low level and just show up for the fellowship.

A good analogy of the situation would be a room with 50 people in it and 10 chairs. 9 people sit down and one chair is left open. The other 41 people remain standing. Do you think something might be wrong with that chair? I cant see the code behind the pkl system but I can see the result of it and that result indicates to me that "sumpin aint right"

You may see other posts here about how such and such person is a sword and just pwns this mage or that mage. You may even see an archer get mentioned as a good pk but IMHO folks that are really good pk archers or really good pk melees are just really good at pk. An 8 year old driving a mage can kill most melees and archers.

From my own personal stand point I am not very good at pk. My template is not optomized for pk. I dont have spec magic D nor do I have high base endurance. But...should I have to? My magic D is about 9 points off max (with 70/10 starting focus/self) and my focus/self is about 10 off max. I resist about 1 in 10 when fighting a high level mage pk. If I take the aegis effect on my bow, I lose ALL ability to be offensive. If I dont take the aegis bow I take roughly 200-225 points of damage from a level 7 bolt. If I dodge I cant shoot. If a mage hold casts they just wait on me to pause and blast me. If I heal, they blast me again and I die. I spend most of my time in pkl duels running behind cover. When I shoot, the slightest twitch by the target causes me to miss. If I hit, they take minimal damage unless they were dumb enough to show up in a robe. What is the point? Hell I count it as a victory if I can get a good mage down to 75% health before they kill me.

Just ask me and I will send you my account info and you can log on and pkl with my toon. I guarantee you will not like it.

(oh yeah and btw I just spent 6 weeks specing UA because bow sucks so bad in pkl and now youre nerfing it.)

God Slayer

10-29-2004, 12:33 PM

I really dont' know, what game you guys have been playing for however long you've been suposidly playing it; but never once has Turbine ever put any content clues in the letter to the players, it's simply to inform you of what mechcanical or artistic changes are accuring.

This whole big beaf about content and what not is BS.

Frist off content has been pretty steady up until the last month, and even then they made up for it by having live ops

which some of you commented on saying,

"spawning level VOD+ monsters doesn't help, bla bla bla"

ok now let me explain something, if turbine doesn't make extremely difficult monsters than some level 250 char will run up and own it and then nobody gets a chance to at least see the chaos.

you really need to stop this BS, go play another game and then come back and tell me what CONTENT you reseived every month for your money

a new game will obivously have stuff for you to do that's new, it might saticify you for i don't know, a few months,

but like most new games they just dont' care about this monthly updating bs, they just simply put a game out, do a few bug fixes here or there than spend their money on making a xpack that costs 40 bucks on top of the 14+ dollars you pay a month

yea that's right not only do you pay less than the average MMO player does but you get 100 times the content and dev contact than other games allow.

you take all this freedom and piss all over it, and it's completely stupid, yea sometimes i dont' like what Turbine does, but you know what so long as the core elements that make this game great are still in place, which they are, than i'm happy as i know most of you are.

them tweaking 1 weapon out of thousands of options is stupid. come back here and say you where nerfed when you've never expreienced your intire class be so nerfed that it was impossible to kill antyhing aka you'd had to have played AO in the frist year or several classes in EQ.

they're giving us many things that have been a long time comming, in less than 5 months we will have a new xpack, billing system and many new players.

after that we will get another xpack addon for free to those that bought the xpack, which will have the kingdom wars people have complaining they dont' have for the longest time. as well as other things i'm sure.

now what's really your problem?

btw, the mroe you complain and whine and call the devs stupid, the less they'll be into doing things to help you ever think of that.

Stith

10-29-2004, 12:37 PM

Again. DoT and crits on Weeping Sword are going UP. Phantom Sword and Deadly Hollow Sword are not being changed. Where are folks getting this "sword is being nerfed"? It's NOT.

UA: Weeping Claw damage is going up. Deadly Hollow Katar is staying the same. Only the Phantom Katar is going down because it was doing more damage than any other PvP weapon.

Weeping and Phantom Bow DoT is only being decreased a small fraction. Hollow Bow damage is going up.

And I'm saying that as a melee that's tried PKL and been dissapointed every time, the Phantom Katar should stay the same, and every other weapon should be boosted up using that as the baseline.

Regardless of whether sword gets a little better, if you're overall not gonna make melee PK weapons do as much as the phantom katar does now, you've failed at balancing melee PK.

Mildly amused

10-29-2004, 12:50 PM

Wow.
II mean OH MY GAWD does turbine/ibn really think that the collective intelligence of their players is so pathetically low that they can issue statements like this.

I would have expected a reasonably well thought out and articulated response
to what has become possibly the greatest issue in this game, NOT a juvenile knee jerk reaction.

Aub

They quite obviously think so. And they might be right. I still havent unsubscribed which was my first impulse after reading Ibn's wonderful, caring and understanding reply.

Dushman

10-29-2004, 12:55 PM

Adding art is easy. Making sure the items the art is tied to work and are properly implemented is a different matter.

Scenario is the man!! :)

Now if he would just take my idea of being able to dye trim and run with it... :D

MisatoX

10-29-2004, 12:57 PM

It sucks that the masks and guises are getting delayed since I was also looking forward to them in October/November, but don't we always get them during celebration month anyways? We haven't killed the buruns yet ;)

stargrove

10-29-2004, 01:00 PM

I like the idea of social centers and would like to offer some feedback. This is specifically on the items (such as the mansion foundation) that give buffs. The the social centers would be perfect place to add such an item. One for creature, one for item magic and one for portal buffs.

evolutionoccurs

10-29-2004, 01:07 PM

W.o.W. :D Good One. /e waves.

JJC

10-29-2004, 01:26 PM

> Once the specific issue was pinned down, you'll note that I gave a specific answer.

Where? You didn't identify what you percieved as a problem and didn't identify when you could even possibly begin to consider fixes. We didn't even get a nod as to making the content you add from now to then not adding to the problem. There was nothing in your answer that could have been labeled specific since you avoided being specific in the answer.

JJC

Heideggar

10-29-2004, 01:31 PM

"The DoT will be higher than it was prior to the nerf." - Ibn

Which nerf? Aren't there like 5 of em? lol

"November will have considerably more new content than October, as will December." - Ibn

Ibn, ANY content would equal or surpass October's amount of content lol. You're really not setting the bar high here : )

But, the LttP is suppose to express new tech, and other game dynamic changes, of which they all seem to be fixes in some form or fashion. Nothing new in terms of positive new tech or game dynamics. Again.

But hey, at least we're coming up on the 1 year aniversary of Turbine still trying to improve the worth of housing. It doesn't help that my mansion is still bugged when thinking of how big of a shaft mansion owners have gotten from you guys. I'm glad we have limited hookable portals, I mean, those portals to the dires are freakin AwesomE!@!#ONEONEONE.

"Sooner rather than later" - Turbine 2003
"Not enough resources" - Turbine 2004
"???" - Turbine 2005

During the past several months with all this low resource stuff going on, did Turbine even once consider hiring more people to help them out, or did you guys think that reducing the content and new game dynamics/tech because resources were used to create an Xpack (We have to pay for this) and Billing Migration (used for all Turbine products, not just AC) was acceptible?

See, I'm glad there is an XPack and Billing Migration, I'm not glad that what I normally pay for (content and game dynamics) gets cut severely for this, and then I gotta pay for it AGAIN. That's just stupid. I'm not buying your XPack. Especially since it won't be completely available to the public (getting the second half) until 3rd or 4th quarter of 2005.

With all the things that need to be fixed, putting in an XPack with all the problems isn't a wise thing to do.

Protes

10-29-2004, 01:32 PM

Great idea stargrove, I like it :)
I think there should also be one for life magic.
Also would be nice if there were temporary bonus spells for crafting & tinker skills, kind of like the spells from Font of Jojii yet these spells would have a much shorter duration maybe lasting only a few minutes.

DarkEdge

10-29-2004, 01:36 PM

All this PvP talk is making me sick. There are more issues than that going on with Asheron's Call. The community has become so hard headed. What happened to developers making games, and patching to fix bugs? The AC community is more like, make it this way devs or you suck, and so will your game. If you dont I'll quit, etc...

I remember a time when the devs did just fine on there own and still do. Asheron's Call is a constantly evolving game. If you dislike it so much why do you still play? The devs have a vision, and we just have to wait and see where its going just like we have done so for the last 5 years.

DarkEdge

10-29-2004, 01:43 PM

B. Blood

10-29-2004, 03:14 PM

DarkEdge I couldnt agree with you more. There was a time when people would discuss their expoits and compare game notes and share experiences that may assist other players along the way. Now it's a contest to see who can sound more disappointed. I mean you people willingly pay to play this game. Why? If it sux so bad dont play. And dont give me the standard answers about how without criticism the game cant get better, because this is way beyond constructive criticism. If you believe half of these posters, Turbine Devs are not only not doing what you ask, but are doing so out of some Evil desire to screw with your lives. Of course this game could improve, however, in my opinion it is one the only ones out there that is constantly striving to do just that. If you want to call me a Fanboy, I say of course I'm a fanboy, if you pay for it and spend time doing it and your not a fan, well you are missing the whole point.

Humble opinion brought to you by B. Blood Sword Swingin Drunk from Holtburg :D

-Kaxak-

10-29-2004, 04:41 PM

I play a melee on Darktide. Sword, specifically.

ok ok , Now I see why sword gets all the Love ,and why Mages get the Nurfs , Now I understand why melee's get Wards and shield that help reduce the damage done by a mage that SPENT 26 skill points to do damage that doesn't get done because of wards and shields added after the fact .........

AC PvP has become a joke , so wtf Ibn , you want us all to become swords with melee so nobody can die ?

Mage should always be at the top of the food chain , Archers next because they can not wield shields , the rest of the bottom scum low skill gimps ( sword , axe , staff , Ua ) ( no need to add TW in here cuz nobody does TW as a main char ) should run in fear of any mage and or archer , but all I see is nurfs for the mage and now I know why :eek:

Zenra_Icewind

10-29-2004, 06:27 PM

I want to know when I'm going to be able to hit anything again on my main. Being an archer is tough, and I rarely play her now. All her levelling from 99-112 has so far been all the hard work of my -one- active (soon to be inactive) Vassal.

It's not nice when Melees are hittings things at 70 that I can't even hit at 110. -When- is this going to be adressed?

I'll give a case in point.

My melee, Later, was moved from OHN when the loot was downgraded (due to its level area) to the Lugian Citadel out in the desert. Now then, Gotrok and Raiders spawn in here from raider extas to raider Juggernauts. Ok, got me so far? Alright.

Later's spear buffed, at that time, to 400. She was owning everything in that dungeon, all the way up to the raider juggernauts.

Elrihm's bow skill buffs to 400 -now- and she still can't hit the Gotrok Juggernauts worth a flip.

Now just from my observation on how these creatures have their meleeD and missileD set up, it's like (not stating it is) the MissileD and MeleeD are equal. NOw if that -were- true and my bow skill buffs to 400 -now- I -should- be able to hit the juggernauts better than I do.

But I don't. It's very frustrating, and I want at least something to be -said- about it. Not necessarily done, but at least something -said-.

Yula_the_Mighty

10-29-2004, 06:35 PM

Elrihm's bow skill buffs to 400 -now- and she still can't hit the Gotrok Juggernauts worth a flip.

Are you using full accuracy and still missing? During the great rebalancing of critters - Turbine changed critters missile defense so that if you are hunting in your level range you can not hit them with the bar set all the way to the left.

To get the hit accuracy I desire, Warin - my Atlatl user always uses full power for maximum accuracy and hits just fine.

Yula the Mighty - HG

_b0o

10-29-2004, 06:48 PM

ok ok , Now I see why sword gets all the Love ,and why Mages get the Nurfs , Now I understand why melee's get Wards and shield that help reduce the damage done by a mage that SPENT 26 skill points to do damage that doesn't get done because of wards and shields added after the fact .........

AC PvP has become a joke , so wtf Ibn , you want us all to become swords with melee so nobody can die ?

Mage should always be at the top of the food chain , Archers next because they can not wield shields , the rest of the bottom scum low skill gimps ( sword , axe , staff , Ua ) ( no need to add TW in here cuz nobody does TW as a main char ) should run in fear of any mage and or archer , but all I see is nurfs for the mage and now I know why :eek:

HILARIOUS, one player argues that all devs play mages and thats why mages are so powerful. Ibn states he plays a melee and now another player argues that all devs play swordsman and thats why swordsman are all powerful!

gotta love the (no) of some people.

arcgremlin

10-29-2004, 07:05 PM

"Weeping and Phantom Bow DoT is only being decreased a small fraction. Hollow Bow damage is going up."

imo hollow bows should not be increased in damage

and weeping damage should go slightly up if anything =/ ah well
you say it's fitting in with your plans, we can hope

Frank The Knife

10-29-2004, 07:06 PM

I play a melee on Darktide. Sword, specifically.

Man so how on earth didnt you throw a fit after they destroyed the damage sword puts out?

All the melees I know and just taking a quick look at your own PVP board tells a story of 5 months of hell for any melee but UA.

Sprawl

10-29-2004, 07:09 PM

DarkEdge

10-29-2004, 07:09 PM

Thats what I am talking about. People don't add any constructive criticism anymore. Its like they just want to complain just to do so. If you don't like the PvP situation then state what you think is wrong, then what you would do.

I'm not a fan boy either, and I am upset with Turbine, but atleast I voice my opinions in a way that they won't ignore me or laugh.

Frank The Knife

10-29-2004, 07:13 PM

DarkEdge

10-29-2004, 07:20 PM

I don't need to read the PvP boards to see that some peoples responses are out of line. I know there is a PVP issue. I also know they get the least attention at times. Fact is that in this feedback, there have been many hostile posts. :p

Daliaeod

10-29-2004, 07:21 PM

Yeah we are recieving a small gift filling 1 pack slot for the 5th year of AC. If anything it should be xp, honestly the items we recieve don't really help. We should be rewarded in total xp earned in the battle of dereth's freedom.

It should be 10% of total xp earned. So if you have 2,000,000,000 total xp you you recieve 200mil xp as a gift. Now that is a present worth giving. More xp to those people who have done more work in dereth. Unless you are 126+ and therefore you only recieve 350mil flat rate. To me xp is better than any item they wish to give unless it is an item that reflects your characters Specialized skill(s). The more specialized skills the greater your chance of not getting the item which reflects the skill you really want.(Increase demand)

So for a mage, he would recieve a bracelet that has the following spells:
Major War Aptitude
Major Focus
Major Self

Now this would be a good gift, but of course it probably will be just rainment saying "Thank You" for your patronage and keep up the good work.

Straz Level 105 BM HG

AzulDrakkon

10-29-2004, 07:22 PM

Weeping and Phantom Bow DoT is only being decreased a small fraction. Hollow Bow damage is going up.
-Ibn

Why?
Why?
Why?

Weeping already does less than hollow in about 80% of PvP (Darktide) battles.

...Buffing hollow while nerfing weeping is a slap in the face. What happened to Weepings being the best and Hollows being the worst? Give me ONE logical reason for this, please.

arcgremlin

10-29-2004, 07:23 PM

I am level 237 dagger fighter. My template is not made for pk OBVIOUSLY but for pvm. However when I face a level 100 mage, I lose. I go toe to toe with all melees/archers, even the best melee sword/ua fighters without a problem. Now I understand that war magic costs more so it should be stronger yada yada, but pvp has become in many respects a game for the mages. As Hungwell points out in his monarchy, we at Clan Z on Frostfell struggle as well to do pkl events that are fair... and surprisingly the high level capped mage wins every single time. It's like playing monopoly or some other game, already knowing who is gonna win at the end.

Out of 11,000 followers, we get about 15 mages and a few lowbies that just wanna hang out, that show up. Now compare this with other things we do, like let's say, Bobo Quest... where hundreds go.

Sprawl

perhaps if you went 100 end/coord/focus
and spec'd dagger resist and critter magic
you would find you would be able to compete with equal level mages

once a mage caps out war, resist, and health, nothing else he's going to do really helps him all that much

once a melee caps out resist, str(or in your case coord), critter magic, health, focus, self, gts an aegis, and is warded to all types

he becomes very pow3rful, if not even more powerful than an equally leveled mage, at least AS powerfull

seeing as you are dagger, you should be able to get 2 quick hits in inbetween each and every war

now, as long as you dodge every war whilst doing this
the mage will be forced to regen much more often

which is where you get him on the defensive
attacking full power

just don't be risky, and keep the hits on the mage steady
always ready to switch to full power the second the mage starts healing or s2m or revit

also, one thing a lot of the melees who complain about mages being overpowered seem to do alot

is stray far away from the mage

when you are hit, you best be dodging the next war spells while healing right up against that mage
if you are running further than a foot or so away from the mage, you won't have time to react and go full power, nor will you be able to get the two hits in per war either

Litar

10-29-2004, 07:55 PM

Just so I got this right...Weeping Bow's DoT and Critical hits have both been decreased? Wow...and I thought you guys were actually trying to make things better for archers. I mean, when melee and mage characters both agree that archers can't hit mages until their point blank, I'd think after 5 years you'd look into it. Maybe you should reroll an archer instead of a sword character, Ibn! Or at the very least, tell us what character you play so we can enjoy it all the more each time we pk you ingame. :mad:

AzulDrakkon

10-29-2004, 08:29 PM

We've been waiting over a year, whats another 2-3?

Silifi Of Death

10-29-2004, 08:59 PM

ok ok , Now I see why sword gets all the Love ,and why Mages get the Nurfs , Now I understand why melee's get Wards and shield that help reduce the damage done by a mage that SPENT 26 skill points to do damage that doesn't get done because of wards and shields added after the fact .........

AC PvP has become a joke , so wtf Ibn , you want us all to become swords with melee so nobody can die ?

Mage should always be at the top of the food chain , Archers next because they can not wield shields , the rest of the bottom scum low skill gimps ( sword , axe , staff , Ua ) ( no need to add TW in here cuz nobody does TW as a main char ) should run in fear of any mage and or archer , but all I see is nurfs for the mage and now I know why :eek:

...wow... I really hope this person is being sarcastic.

ElronOfDarktide

10-29-2004, 09:59 PM

HAHAHAHA

a patch that does something, WOW!!!!

i think AC is getting its first patch in years right now. This november.

for a lot of months patches have just ruined the game. You admited yourselves how the melee nerf was totally bogus, it is fixed this patch. Looking at how much the damage will be reduced now that it is actually "fixed" corectly will be funny. Because it will be hillarious to see how low you left it and for how long.... and to ponder the impact of that blunder on your subscription totals.

now that things are going to be better i am super happy to see higher weild req weapons coming. This is PVM content right now. These wepons do NOTHING in pvp, loot weapons are NOT pvp content. Hopefully that blunder will someday be fixed.

its not that complicated a fix. Make ULTRA (max damage+craft 4 or less) tinkered 9x with all damage increaser + imbued with PVP imbue do SLIGHTLY more then weeping. FIXED. Minor BD and Major BD would do slightly more then slightly more then weeping. WEAPONS WOULD BE VALUABLE TO PK CHARACTERS AGAIN!!!, cuz you HATED ON US with the weeping weapons man...weepings were just a big PK nerf!!!!)

Elron

packing

10-29-2004, 11:10 PM

i hope u get it right this time the ua phantom is not the only ua overpowerd every ua is the weeping ua hits harder then sword when maxed or bout the same and same thing goes for pvm weapons and what about the extra 5 mele bonus they get and the faster speed animation i hope u guys considerd that when u went to fix the dot plz respond to this ibn let me know if u guys did something bout this

Zenra_Icewind

10-29-2004, 11:21 PM

Are you using full accuracy and still missing? During the great rebalancing of critters - Turbine changed critters missile defense so that if you are hunting in your level range you can not hit them with the bar set all the way to the left.

To get the hit accuracy I desire, Warin - my Atlatl user always uses full power for maximum accuracy and hits just fine.

Yula the Mighty - HG

I don't play my archer with anything less than full accuracy. It's kinda pointless not to. I kinda don't understand why there's even an option to slide it back to speed, cept for like, the Gaerlan door.

Yula_the_Mighty

10-29-2004, 11:42 PM

I don't play my archer with anything less than full accuracy. It's kinda pointless not to. I kinda don't understand why there's even an option to slide it back to speed, cept for like, the Gaerlan door.

Hmm - I have an archer vassal about your level that hunts sometimes in the Dires and surely has fired a few arrows at Jugs and Titans. I do remember his unhappiness when he encountered Raider Jugs - do not remember if he was firing arrows at them - or if they just decided to join in the fun. Time to ask him some questions about the big Lugians ability to avoid his arrows.

Yula the Mighty - HG

Furcifer

10-30-2004, 01:14 AM

Sorry to ask this again, but I really want to know the answer....

If most melee weapons base their damage off of strength, but UA is mainly or at least partially based off of skill unlike the rest.... what is dagger based off of? I need to know what to pump my XP into so I can do more damage, hehe.

-Kaxak-

10-30-2004, 03:49 AM

I don't play my archer with anything less than full accuracy. It's kinda pointless not to. I kinda don't understand why there's even an option to slide it back to speed, cept for like, the Gaerlan door.

PK , PK , PK , PK , PK .................

mage without missile [=||==============] is dead

fighting a mage with missile [ ===============||=] archer is dead

the longer it takes to fire one arrow the more time a mage has to kill you , Because as you might not know you have to be still while shooting and waiting for that bar to hit full is a joke ..........

My n0ob archer has 300 base bow (non-spec)

some idiot mage with buffed 250 missile and she can't hit him even on half bar . people the game is a joke ....... missile is TOTALLY outta wack !!!

DarktideRep

10-30-2004, 06:06 AM

I read this subject, and I just had to register to give my opinion.

I respect turbine more the any other video game company. They made an amazing game, and have stuck with. You guys bust your ass to provide content every month. This is very impressive, and in many other mmorpgs, this would be sublime, as a few hardly ever get patched.

Asheron's call, in my opinion, is two different games. One, is Morningthaw, Harvestgain, Frostfell, Thistledown, Solclaim, Verdantine, Leafcull. The other is Darktide.

Darktide is so fundementally different, a lot of people from O.o servers say, "Wow, it's like a whole new game." Why you might ask? Because everyone KILLS YOU. It's a harder, much more rewarding existence. As you grow stronger, that run skill seems to actually be important, and jump, is looking good for when you need to jump off a cliff to escape, or onto a plateau to get away from some nasty war spells.

Darktide is a different place, and I think it needs special attention. I honestly think that universal item rules, like dmg, melee defense mods, etc... need to be tweaked on darktide because of the fact that pvp is so integral to everyday life. I'm reading these posts about pkl, and how they get 30 people to do these big fights. And seriously, this is nothing compared to darktide. Imagine q'bar so filled with people that you have 5 wars flying at you at any single moment, from 4 different people.

All this tweaking to pvp is giving us darktide players a headache, because it might not adversely affect the target whiners over in O.o land, because it was designed to benefit them, but you can damn well expect it effects every single one of us in Darktide. People build their character templates, and their pking skills around the expectation of what a weapon can and can't do, and when you start changing these numbers, things get really screwed up.

Mages control darktide, for one because their spells are by far the most powerful things in darktide, and 2, they rarily change enough to cause a problem. If anything, they've gotten better and better. When you guys made it so that a level 7 streak could be cast without that half second spell animation, you really screwed over a lot of people. Those melee's running for their lives, expecting that half second buffer moment to keep them safe until they can get behind that rock are screwed.

I don't even remember the reason for the change in streaks, but if my memory serves me right, it had to deal with pvm. I think that in O.o land, they should keep that lack of animation, but in Darktide they need to put it back. You talk about game balance, but you are balancing in the wrong direction. Mages are gods on darktide, they are hard to kill. It can take easily 3 melees on one mage to kill it.

And now you want to make it so mages get another more special attention? What!? Am I missing something? War magic is so disgustingly overpowered it's not even funny. An aegis is a great idea until they hit you that second time. The numbers are, and correct me if I'm wrong, 90 damage from a mage who has a vulned a melee who has a major ward on, with aegis and a buff, and I hear this moan proceeding from them. Since when was 90 damage a bad thing!? Do you miss the days when you could one hit anything that wasn't a second mage? It's funny, melee's ussually don't have the life of a mage, and of all the classes, and templates, mages still have the MOST life.

Honestly, I think you at turbine should assign two or three people to work full time on darktide. JUST darktide, they don't mess with the other servers. To hear out only people from Darktides' ideas, thoughts, recommendations, etc... Because one majority of opinions is, we should get rid of housing in Darktide. Or at least get rid of those magic fields where people can't run through. Yeah, thats right, no one even thought that opinion could even exist. There are a lot of supporters of the old days when no where was safe, and town raids were more fun without people crawling back to their mansions. And Lifestone suprise attacks were common. Now, I personally am not a supporter of this, but my point is, there are a lot of opinions in darktide, I feel aren't getting attention, or are getting thumbed noses thrown at them.

PVM rules and PVP rules ussually don't work well together. There are exceptions, but a lot of darktide residents really groan when they find out a weapon other then magic is getting nerfed, because chances are, it's going to affect them.

An archer can't fair well against a mage, I get really angry when I see 12 hollow arrows, which can be hard to come by, go to waste. Because he's pressing the 'z' and 'c' keys while clicking the fire magic bolt whatever button on his screen. Slide casting is a major problem, and has been for years, but it's still there, and a few mages groan about the bow bug, and suddenly your up in arms for their cause? Hmmm, doesn't seem prejudiced to me, not at all.

There is a very large Dichotomy between the worlds. In O.o land, a shadow fragment is worthless but over here in Darktide, they go for 5 - 10 plats depending on if your friends with the guy. Steel is a huge commodity here, and everyone wants it. We tend to need it more, as it stops hollows in there tracks, or used to anyway.

Whenever the devs do something for the carebears, whether it be making certain spells better, or changing % generated treasure, you can damn well expect it will impact the pks as well. There will always be someone there to exploit the fact you don't do as much damage anymore, and they do the same amount as ever. And ussually, thats a mage.

Melees and Archers are the underdogs, and when a neat advantage shows itself like the hollow bow or phantom katar, we take it in a heart beat. Because even though YOU show us the numbers compared to other hollow weapons, WE point to our screen and say "I'm taking 233 points of damage per war from this dude named Zojack Ownith, and I'm only doing 60 a hit, on a critical hit.

Then you do this thing, "We're going to fix certain bugs, and balance things out." I'm all for fixing bugs, but some should stay. Like the bow bug. DON'T!!!! PLEASE DON'T!!!

Lets look at the facts: In the middle of a battle, when your adrenaline is pumping, and your trying to calm yourself down while being ganked by 2 punk mages, does the thought of using the bow bug really occur to you? Ussually not. Most archers are too busy side running in circles hoping not to be smacked by an arc spell to face a slanted wall and jump backwards, and hit the fire button, while the mage is still in his spectrum of view.

So we've established that in the middle of a fight, it's hard to get set up while trying not to die. Now let's look at WHERE we can do it. Not a lot of places. Most fights occur in dungeons, and towns. The main part of the town, not the outpost mind you. And the best place for the slanted wall portion of the bug is the outpost. Thats one of the few places you can actually do the bug.

Also, lets not forget, it's FUN to do! Yes, fighting other people is fun, but when you can actually pull off one of these, you're normally sitting in your chair saying, "Damn, I don't believe that actually worked!" I've taken my friends and we bought some store bow, and just started to pummel eachother laughing and having a good time, and I totally want to do this again some day.

Perhaps now you're saying, "Mr. subscriber, we don't know where you get your information, but we recieve a lot of complaints from people on darktide." Now let's think about this, at any given time, there has to be a fight going on, maybe 6, how often does a mage fight an archer, how many times in one day do mages fight archers? What I'm saying is, there are a lot of fights going on, and some people are whining at you about it, but I don't think most are. The people who are whining are the mages who run around slide casting, and lagging up the place so people can't do anything, and when they get a taste of their own medicine they scream. "OMFG LOSER YOU SUCK!" and yes, people do really say that. It's these idiots that want it gone because it kills them. Well in the warning before you log on, it says to not whine to the devs about dieing, or being betrayed, etc... I think this is just another way someone is winning in a pvp fight, and should be kept. I think most people on Darktide are in favor of keeping this little trick. Perhaps we should have an actual in game pole? Where when you log in, you chose "In favor, Not in favor" one per account.

And before this really long post is concluded, I just want to say, I think that a lot of those old tricks of the trade bugs, that people managed to do, should be restored. These are things people have learned to do through their time playing on Asheron's Call, albeit not all of them are fair, but I think some have some neat things to them. It's because of these tricks, slide casting, spell trapping, spin jump, etc... that skill in pvping actually becomes something without numbers. All of a sudden, it's not as important your character has 409 health, because you know how to fight on Darktide, or in PvP in general. It doesn't matter your melee character has no magic d, because you know that little trick into getting the spell to faze out (you know the one, where someone casts a spell at you, and you do the little jig, then run into it, and it explodes on you, but you don't get hurt)It's things like these that make Asheron's call game engine, and pvp engine so awesome, and the best pvp game out there.

Do you know what pvp in everquest is like? You literally stand there and hope you do more damage then the other guy. It's a total failure. In that game, one level makes all the difference, but not here. Here a level 45 archer, with amazing skills, can beat a level 100 mage with meager skills even though he's 55 levels ahead of him. IVE SEEN IT HAPPEN!

Brokos

10-30-2004, 08:38 AM

Here is a problem on VT and I guess on any new server you guys make.

What needs doing more than anything else is making more dungeons along the lines of the 80+ Matron Hive for higher level players. It is a shame to see level 120's still having to level in an 80 dungeon. The dungeon gets camped etc.

The same holds true for the lower levels. What you have is phyntos wasps from 30-60, scalvis for 60 along with the 60+ matron hive for some melees who go there. After that it's mostly 80+ matron hive till level 126.

One fix would be to make an identical matron hive at another easy to get to location, much like Turbine did the 30+ olthoi dungeons years ago.

A much better fix would be to make one with harder bugs and better loot for 100+.

I know the fanbois may come out and "this dungeon" or "that dungeon" is great. The truth of the matter is quite different.

Look at where people are really going to level. Those are places where the insane damage by magic war spells is non-existant, critters drop good loot, give good xp and also places that are Easy to get to. And that is.... well its the 80+ matron hive for the most part.

I like the AC devs but yall really need to quit looking at some of the things that dont matter and look where players really are and what they are doing and what they need. Who cares if a phantom weapon gives 2% or whatever more damage or less damage. That probably takes up 1/2 of 1% of the communities concerns into consideration, but everyone levels.

kermit

10-30-2004, 11:46 AM

You say your trying to bring more people to towns. I assume the the raids on the towns is part of that theory. I think the raids have stoped allegiances from hanging out in towns because their buff bots or afk toons would be killed. Towns should be safe zones. Raids will make the towns scarce just like when the statues came to life.

Just an idea for you maybe an npc that randomly ask people to find a random item, and the first to return will recieve a random award (SIKS, sing keys, packdolls.gromnies etc.). It would be a random scavanger hunt type thing that would make people when they are not hunting to sit near the npc in towns.

I do understand that you have other things you need to get done, like fixing and implemting launcher to break away from the evil MS, but I hope the content is in this next patch like you say, to many more of the "october patches" will have people running to other games.

Looking foward to what you have planned, I must say when you release some good content it's amazing and keeps me comming back.

Rawen

10-30-2004, 04:53 PM

I really don't want to be a nay-sayer here, but I have worked in software product management for a long time and I see some trends within this game's development that really are outside the boundaries of customer retention.

The last few patches have been ridiculously thin, somewhat buggy, and over the last year have resulted in an embarrassing amount of rollbacks and apologies. While I fully understand the exceptional need for a hotfix/rollback/reset, this should be an exception, not normal practice.

Also - things like development of promised quests, masks, seasonal things... pushed back due to what? Hire more developers and QA folks with the EXTRA REVENUE Turbine is getting from the price increase. This is truly outrageous that I'm paying more for a product that has reduced in quality.

On that note, my price for each account went up by $3.00 each month quite some time ago, yet it seems the patch quality has gone down (from my perspective). I am not a fan of Microsoft, but at least it seemed Turbine was creatively accountable during those days.

In short - I am the closest I've ever been to letting my subscription run out and moving on to another game full-time. Even the idea of more content in the 'expansion' doesn't warrant this anymore.

Someone in turbine's product management needs to be 'redistributed' and new blood needs to be put in to not only improve the product to get an increased player base - but to keep the existing player base from jumping ship...

My $.02

Hungwell

10-30-2004, 06:08 PM

yeah outsource some work to india. they work there for about 1/4 what you guys do

:eek:

heh sorry just bein mean

Aztek

10-30-2004, 06:17 PM

Well I never imagined I would play this game for 5 years in the first place.

I could make a mile long post about whats gone wrong with things but ill stick to just a few items.

1) Nerfing the loot back in the day was a huge mistake. I know its better now but for something done "for the good of the game" I just dont find the joy in hunting like I used to. Since the loot nerf Ive replaced 1 item in my suit and mangaed to find one 2 wands and one bow interesting enough to add to my inventory or make an impact on my character. I stopped hunting altogether about 3 months ago. I just wait for the sneaky macro dudes to post the stuff they find and trade for it. I mean they macro 24 hours a day they can find the uber stuff, I dont have the time.

2) Mages still are king. A good mage of any level can beat me (level 220 archer) because of game glitches in animation. Mages were never meant to be able to move while casting upon inception of the game. That one break in the engine (although it makes the game more fun for mages I will agree to that) has broken pvp ever since the first mage started slide casting back in the day. Think of all the changes made to make melees and archers compete solely because of the broken game mechanic that seemingly cannot be fixed.

3) Lack of content based around fighting for control of a location. Bindstones in towns were a good start but there is no reason to claim a town. Nothing to fight for.

4) The level difference between old an new players on DT. Without macroing new people will never catch up or be competitive within a reasonable timeframe. Thats a fact. Darktide is the pvp server. There should be a way to start of with a competitive character. That is the solution to people just quitting or not even starting because they dont have the time or inclination to level up a level 200. Yes the difference between a level 200 and a level 126 doesnt seem that much on paper but the reality is its a "perceived" huge advantage, therefore people do not attempt to overcome it. Result, potential new players or white world converts quit instead of comeing to darktide. My guess is if they had a level 100+ to start of with or could transfer their char over they would not quit.

5) Population loss. Its tme to put in the code to move characters and/or consolidate servers. Logging on to 400 people during primetime on DT isnt any fun for players and Im sure isnt any fun for the bean counters at turbine that pay the bandwith charges.

Im not quitting. Im just not playing the game nearly as often as im trying out other games to find the next one I want to play exclusively for next few years.

In the end I thank you for 5 years of (frustrating at times) enjoyment. If you are unable to accomadate the changes needed to save the game (as opposed to the changes you have made to save the game that dont seem to be working) then Ill move on like alot of other people seem to have done ;)

DrCykosis

10-31-2004, 06:14 AM

I am etching this quote in stone and save other comments for patch day.

Oh wait.. I do have one comment I can't hold back -- December guises? This is beyond ludicrous. What will they be? Elves and Reindeer?

I hear ya there well maybe i'll wait till dec to come back...Oh wait NM prob be on hold till next Oct.... :(
Sorry but feeling left out here. Power leveling bore's the heck out of me, I'm an old timer here and highest is only 116 still. Only things i realy enjoy now are missions/quests, and finding neat shiny objects to stick on my many mules *8 total*. Second Halloween I've been bumped to the side. Ah well Back to Trick or Treating in CoH....

X I no longer want you to keep my payment information

Final_Destiny

10-31-2004, 05:00 PM

I play a melee on Darktide. Sword, specifically.

Cool, so have u killed anybody last 5 months?... lol

wintergale

10-31-2004, 06:52 PM

I find it very intersting that the devs can manage go come up with a bow bug fix when it is being exploited. However, why is it that you cant fix the other issues? Jump spin, slide chug, ETC ETC ETC.

Why dont you reduce the mage movement too thats where many problems lie.

Why reduce bow crits? I mean for crying out loud bow was ignored for so long and FINALLY is viable in PvP and the devs reduce the crits? You guys need to stop NERFING BOW. Bow needs to be increased. With maxed bow maxed coord and full vulns my character hits some for under 30. OH wow that needs to be "adjusted".

Increase the damge on tinked weapons make the hardest weapons in the game the most effective. It isnt that hard.

I am nearing the end of my rope after nearly 5 years of supporting this game and tolerating many blunders by the devs I am about to cancel my account.

psycho

10-31-2004, 07:32 PM

LoL Masks and Guises moved to december cause you guys were too late to get them in. I'd say just skip it this year. Kinda lame throwing them in in december. My 2 cents.

Chrono

10-31-2004, 08:42 PM

[A bunch of CRAP]

That extra revenue is going to the expansion. The thin patches are a result of development for the turbine launcher/billing so we can get the hell off the zone.

Rhinehold_LC

11-01-2004, 05:44 PM

Looks good to me.

Thankyou for the info.

I am of the beliefe that Fixing the game is almost more important than adding new content, especially with a game as old as AC, and has an imense amount of content to already explore.

keep up the good work.

-R

Ibn

11-01-2004, 07:07 PM

...Buffing hollow while nerfing weeping is a slap in the face. What happened to Weepings being the best and Hollows being the worst? Give me ONE logical reason for this, please.

If a Hollow Bow is doing more damage than a Weeping Bow, the target must not be debuffed. This is by design -- the Weeping will do the most damage, but only if the target is debuffed.

Litar

11-01-2004, 08:04 PM

So does a 166% mod AR bow compare equally with a Weeping Bow or is Weeping Bow suppose to be the most powerful bow for pvp? Are 166% mod AR bows designed to be for PvM instead?

Frieze

11-02-2004, 12:24 AM

Perhaps it would be a good idea to put this phrase in every LttP...

"As usual, the LttP does not list any content additions. You'll have to find those for yourselves!"

And...

"Every year from the October through December, the patches are lighter than usual."
(I understand this as being true? For the last two years at least.)

I don't think it would cut out every panicked response, but it would get most of them ;)

LrdHades

11-02-2004, 10:44 AM

Sounds like a pretty shallow patch with not a lot happening. Maybe I'll be wrong.

Crimson-Ghost

11-02-2004, 01:12 PM

I'll keep this simple, the guises not being in October OR November is beyond dissapointing, its to the point where we ask ourselves "why the **** do they even bother?". You think people will put together costumes and hang out in december? Not bloody likely, not to mention it's a little hard to choke down the idea of hunting scarecrows when theres snow on the ground.

Honestly, how can you even think that its reasonable to toss them in december, what a half-assed attempt to reconcile the situation. It was bad enough you delayed them for October, but delaying them past November is inexcusable.

I literally dread reading the LTTP every month to see what else you guys have messed up or nerfed or "failed to comprehend the horrendously unbalancing and yet pathetically obvious side effects that all the EDUCATED players warned you about not to do, changes you decide to toss in hap-hazardly".

Frankly, I'm fed up with these changes and I don't think I'm willing to wait another 5-6 months until you release the expansion in hopes that you won't have killed off the playerbase by then.

I'm gonna stop writing now before I get perma banned.

Zaerik-MT

11-02-2004, 03:40 PM

Yes ghost, cause im sure all of us play just for the neat little costumes they put in every halloween, and if we dont we call turbine stupid. Real Smart.

Vlad Morbius

11-02-2004, 04:15 PM

I hardly think that was the point he was trying to make :rolleyes:

Crimson-Ghost

11-02-2004, 05:02 PM

LOL, of course the guises won't make people quit, but if you don't think people are quitting every day because of the lame content (see current patch) or horrible mistakes they've made to pvp (see last few months), you're crazy. It makes it worse that there are people telling them they're making mistakes and present sound arguements on here NOT to change certain things and yet they go ahead anyways and then a couple months later we get a "we failed to see the impact this would have on...". Thing is, they don't fail to see anything, they just failed to listen to their players who tell them they are making mistakes. If you want to be the devil's advocate and try to pick at what i'm posting and attempt to make a non sequitur then go ahead, but clearly you can comrephend that this is just one more thing (and to some people it's a big deal, I look forward to the fun of trying to collect all the masks in the short time we're allowed) that they brushed aside without a thought and it aggrivates me.

It goes the same with the melee d wands and the high level AL balance issues for melees, both huge problems and both are "in the works with no ETA". Lol, well theres no "ETA" on how much longer I and others are going to put up with these lackluster patches, get my drift?

ACaddict99

11-02-2004, 06:34 PM

I see a few problems with it. Forgive me for being biased.

Bow doesnt get fredit for the 4 skill credits of fletching when ranking pvp.

Hollow bow does not need to be made better, maybe tweaked down.

While weeping, and phantom need to be better.

Madgic

11-02-2004, 08:03 PM

HIya me again,

Too many pages to read them all and im sure this has been said before but if not here goes.

Ok I have said it about prety much every patch but hay ill say it again.

PvP is fine for melees melee weapons are OK they work as well as I expect. If you look at feedback i think you will find that its all to do with NOT being able to compete with mages.

Once again I see that UAs and Bows are getting used to fighting mages and on occasion they win so what happens Turbine Nerfs them back into place.

Please if you dont want melees to PKL just tell us, dont keep Nerfing us.

Zaerik-MT

11-02-2004, 11:50 PM

Yes, but lets not forget they did warn us about less content while the billing migration/expansion pack, so atleast they are trying and we should give credit to turbine for their hard work with all the new changes happening to the company. Im not a big Player Killer so I wouldnt really know about the unbalances, but they seem to have done what people have asked before in the past yet those people who asked for it may have forgotten that they were the ones with the idea, so they blame turbine.

Hungwell

11-03-2004, 10:18 AM

Zaerik I agree with you on the lack of content. I am one of those guys that has said "Just forget the monthly prop till we are off the zone" I also understand that the expansion is taking time and personnel. I also appreciate the fact that we get more content than any other game out there.

All that being said, I still have trouble stomaching the pvp aspect of the upcomming patch. There are few players that do less PVP than me but as a monarch I am always concerned by what effect game changes will have on my vassals. Even the mages in Meginjarder are upset that the non-mages are being given the shaft. The feeling within my guild about the upcomming changes is 100% negative. In all honesty I saw more positive feedback about the chain nerf than about this pvp change.

In short, the devs need to be more careful than ever whom they upset within the player base. EQ 2 ships in 5 days. WoW ships in 19. UO just released an expansion. Guildwars will hit about the same time as the AC expansion. Every day there are more MMORPGs out there. At 5 years of age, retention should be a big focus of the marketing strategy for AC. Visually, the expansion will not compete with EQ2 or WoW. I have yet to log into WoW but I have seen EQ2 and it is visually awesome. It is still EQ and is not my style of game but for eye candy and initial game sales, it will blow the AC expansion away. The developers of AC are walking on thin ice and I am sad to say that I see the pvp changes as more self serving than as a sincere effort to make things more fair for the entire player base.

Vlad Morbius

11-03-2004, 01:00 PM

More and more you get the feeling that AC is the guinea pig for development of their billing system for future projects. It has been somewhat disheartening to view the compilation of problems and known issues growing and existing ones being shuffled aside for this year long nightmare. Turbine needs to bite the bullet here and actually pour some extra money into the development of content and the fixing of these issues in order to secure the games future when this competition hits the stands.

We need to have a couple months of positives to reinforce the reasons we stay, and less unknown ETA's for fixes needed. Turbine, it's time to bring the fun back into this game, it's time to pour oodles of great things to rekindle the want to log into Dereth and the build the anticipation of this expansion!!
Tell Jessica to open the purse strings and let the mad money flow :D

lino

11-03-2004, 06:12 PM

So what you're saying is, stick to dungeons with only bugs or tuskers if I don't have magic def spec'd? Great. Thx for nuthin. How can it be worth my while to die trying to kill a wisp or a Diamond Golem?

I don't have anything to add here. I died several times to singles and pairs of lvl 90 to 115 monsters while trying to get a fetish of the dark idol with my lvl 128 archer. And on almost every death I was without any chance at all, because (after a vuln) 2 war spells are enough to get me from full health (both endurance and health cost 9M+ per point) to below zero. I wouldnt mind this if I had a real chance of evading, but in most cases I dont have this chance, since even with a rending bow it takes 5+ arrows to kill monsters in that level range and unlike players monsters don't have long wind ups.
(I am not even starting to describe the disaster that happened when I took my lvl 105 sword char out of the matron hive and wanted to show my vassal, who has spent 90% of his ingame time the last two years in dungeons, how funny outside hunting can be. I am still surprised he didnt cancel his accounts after this 'event'.)

lino

DrCykosis

11-04-2004, 02:40 PM

Hmm still a few days left on my Sub as I removed info so guess I can still post...

A Few Things...

Still No content and oct stuff pushed back till Dec now :mad: ...

One of the Main Reasons I've been here for 5+ Yrs *Since Beta 0*. Is New stuff every Month to do. But seems that it's geting slimer all the time. Fancy Objects, packs/masks/etc.., but not even those now. A bit tired of being out of the loop on stuff I like so have fun out there....

Dont care who I pay as long as I can play! and not been doing that as most of the little stuff that is added I do in 1-2 days not even trying...

PVP dont care for it or I'd be on the PK shard..

Maybe I'll be back when xpansion hits... :confused:

Stormowl

11-04-2004, 06:53 PM

SirSargo

11-06-2004, 12:11 PM

All I can say is I've been slowly loosing interest in AC because you've made it too bloody difficult, the quests added are for 80+ and 100+ and i'm only 60ish, I'm bored with only hunting, and frankly the quests I can do are for what purpose? The items gained are useless to my character, so I wind up handing them to vassals. I don't enjoy playing a game for my vassals to gain from, nor do I enjoy hunting grounds that I used to lvl a 35+ up to 50, that now kill my lower characters. I've logged into ac maybe 10 times this last patch. Two years ago I used to see about ten thousand players online every evening in LC, and now I see only six thousand. Many of the people I knew have either cancelled their subscription or just stopped playing very much. I'm strongly considering rethinking what I'm spending 12.95 each month on because honestly I just don't enjoy the game anymore. The little trinkets thrown out there aren't enough to keep me interested. And I'm tired of new quests for 100+, what ever happened to keeping things balaned between the characters? Or do you wish to see only high lvl characters in game now? Because you're doing a smashing job at deterring new players who have never tried ac before from playing it. :confused:

Not completly sure what your stating about low levels, If anything its to easy to level a New charactor now days... To prove this I put my tinked armor on a New Mule gave him Tinked weapons and provided a Buff Bot for him...
I leveled him to 60+ in less than a days time...

This style of play is great if your an Arcade style player but these fast leveling charactors are quickly burned out...

I know the people who enjoy PvP think my way of thinking is considered whining but PvP wasn't what brought most of us to this Game in the first place (so many one On one games are out there for this style), most people came to this game to Explore, Hunt, Defend in the style of Medevial..

As a Senior Council member (4yrs) we have noted the hostialties amongst players on an Average to be brought on by PvP events :mad: Even when it was a person that has a very good reputation normally PvP seems to bring out the Flaring Tempers, I use to spend some of my Time online following around some of the Old Pkers just to watch them DUKE IT OUT like watching a good Boxing match. There was honor amongst them, polite, sharing what they liked about their matchs or didnt understand :cool: Bowing paying respect to one another not using this as a time to become sarcastic, foul mouthed, belligerent, quarrelsome, vindictive, bitter, cruel, nasty people in game as so many now have reputation for. :( its so sad an I know alot of it is youngsters but we are the ones that have to help them understand) :p

Rhinehold_LC

11-06-2004, 01:00 PM

thanks for your responces Ibn, and Scenario.

-R

Bowdiddly

11-08-2004, 01:19 AM

I play a melee on Darktide. Sword, specifically.

Well well well, for 4.5 years I wondered why sword never got nerfed and was by far the single most powerful class in the game.

Thank you IBN for finally answering that for me. Now unnerf the rest of us, I don't want to play sword!

Hungwell

11-08-2004, 10:51 AM

Ok I typed 3 paragraphs and erased them. I will try to be brief.

1. There is a balance issue between the melee weapons and this patch looks like it will address them for pvp.

2. This patch is doing nothing to address the larger issue of balance between melee/archer/mage. Melee's and Archers can now fight each other on a fairly balanced field of play. Archers have trouble hitting twitchy mages. Archers get no aegis effect to help cut spell damage (and dont even think about mentioning the dark bow crap) A melee in combat cannot dodge a mages spell. If a mage screws up and lets an archer hit him, he takes no more than 50 points of damage. If an archer screws up and eats a spell, he takes 200+.

3. The devs took an entire month to address the negligable balance issue internal to melees and ignored the larger pvp issue. While they were wasting our time on this they could have been doing other things to the game that would be enjoyable to the populace.

I believe that explains why I am so upset with this patch.

There is a post above complaining about how tough the game is. I disagree. The game is currently too easy. It has been too easy for over a year. PLEASE take the time to work on monster AI. A few simple tweaks will make the game so much better. A prime example where 5 lines of code will do a lot of good is in the spell selection for monsters. Why does a monster that is smart enough to be a spell caster, cast a fire vuln on me then throw a whirling blade as its next spell? A few lines of code to clean up some monster ai nonsense will do wonders.

Finally, what is up with the lag? There are fewer people playing the game than ever and the lag is really no better than it was 2 years ago. A game as graphicly simple as AC will not cause client side lag on my current PC. My current PC has nearly 10 times the video ram as my previous box and 3 times the processor speed and 4 times the ram. Supposedly our server software has been upgraded and efforts have been made on the development side to reduce lag. Why do I still lag? Why do I lag even more when I go pink? If there is no one else within a million miles of me and I go pink, I lag. Is there so much pvp code involved that it bogs the server down? Is this why DT is so laggy? If so, give us an all white server and I will move there.

Sorry that was a bit of a rant. I am usually willing to take "we cant do it" or "it will take a long time" as an answer but seeing efforts spent on areas that require only tiny changes to balance while other larger areas seem to be completely ignored just bugs me.

Ryori

11-09-2004, 08:29 PM

I am fine with halloween in Dec. Heck, it is a RPG so I can just RP that it is still fall.

With population in towns I would like to point out that when Hebian and Qalabar were packed (WE) most other towns were still empty and this was eons ago. Seems like this is the path you are going so far so that is a positive thing.

The issue I found with the war on creatures is that high magic def negates everything. I (mage) stumbled into a large static pack of casters. They had a very fast respawn and the respawn trapped me in a bad spot. A friend (xbow) was magic def spec and they couldn't touch him. We could both one hit the targets but his magic def made the critters nothing but in bulk they were dangerous to me (actually the respawn was dangerous because my one hit was slower than his).

That might not make sense, but I am trying to say that balancing reward vs risk with casters can be tricky. Does the critter come in packs or solo? Are they very tough to a toon without magic def spec but nothing to one with it? The nature of magic def makes balance a pain, I think.

Toshiro Musashi

11-11-2004, 10:36 AM

Any chance you are going to fix the amount of damage a Bow inflicts on Gaerlaen? As it is, an Archer will NEVER get the kill in GMan as long as there is a Mage or a Melee player in the Fellow. Sorry, but a Bow Crit of 250+ compared to a Mage Crit of 1,000+ to GMan is not quite fair.

Bozo

11-11-2004, 11:19 AM

I don't have anything to add here. I died several times to singles and pairs of lvl 90 to 115 monsters while trying to get a fetish of the dark idol with my lvl 128 archer.
lino

I dont agree : i think magic damage only had more challenge to the game. Furthermore casting spells is "harder" then a melee attak (uses both mana and stamina reserves) and should do more damage. The crucial point here is to choose between melee defense and magic defense in toons templates. As far as my toons are concerned what kill them are war spells and very seldom melee attacks (im not talking about a mage without melee beein swarmed to death by olthois) so i think the best is finding a good equilibrium between these and thats part of the experience u should gather from playing the game.

I would rather like the game become harder, or at least i would welcome a Caul-Vod like zone to be created where higher lvl toons can find creatures that really gives a challenge : a lvl 140 melee with life magic spec can solo pretty much everything in the game nowadays.

Milkman

11-11-2004, 12:39 PM

1. FIX THE LAG
2. FIX THE LAG
3. FIX THE LAG
4. DO NOT RAISE DOT AND LOWER CRITS, DO THE OPPOSITE.
High DOT turns everyone into mindless drones swinging low power and shooting low accuracy, perfect for talentless n00bs. A vital powerful crit will change the tides of battle and make it interesting, zeroing in everyones damage completely takes away from the "pulling up from the disadvantage" type of fights, basically screwing anyone over who doesn't have a gank squad. If you had any want to save this game in its current state, you'd hire someone like Virindi Clown or Rak_KoC that have a grasp of what pvp is and how it works, not the whining "OMG I HAVE NO PK SKILL AND MY LEVEL XXX (mage / melee / archer) ALWAYS DIES TO PEOPLE WITH SKILL THAT ARE LOWER LEVEL WHINE WHINE WHINE MAKE ME INSTA KILL BASED ON LEVEL!!!111!1"

5. Do not listen to unintelligent whiny babbling retards who have no idea how to PvP and post things like "OMG HES GOT 30 LEVELS ON ME HE SHOULDNT BE ABLE TO ATTACK ME" crap.
6. I like the idea about removing mansion recalling so people have to congregate in towns.

Seishin_HG

11-11-2004, 01:04 PM

Adding art is easy.
Had you seen my drawings you might reconsider this position. :D

Ok, kidding aside. Thanks Scenario, to you and all Turbine employees.

kinslayer

11-11-2004, 08:12 PM

i PK alot and everything was fine how it was before u messed with it..

As a 100% capped maged on all my skills now for prob a year of more. I can rip ay melee character a new one. U made it way to ez for me. U guys sit there with #'s and go o.O to much damage etc. Well i don't see u playin with us in ayan to where the skill is involed. Today 2 other people and I ripped a crowd of 15 gankers melee characters apart. It was sad as sin. Put it back to what it was so they have a chance.

Jet-eye-nite

11-11-2004, 08:24 PM

I am not playing any of my chars until you guys fix your botched up patch .So this will make atleast 2 days of down-time .

Suicidal Bowman

11-11-2004, 09:58 PM

Ok if you remove mansion recall people will be in a world of hurt if they want to put something in their allegiance community pool. weapons, armour, fletching items, trade items.... out allegiance has members that make things for other members so we cna all work as a team to make the allegiance stronger as characters and as a community, you get rid of Mansion Recall and we take all that hard work and blow it out of the water.

ted nudgent

11-11-2004, 10:20 PM

ok lets see im speced bow/ua. lets see which to pick from pvp bow hmm a high lvl mage can stand there and heal faster than i can hit him and 2 hits im dead!(375 health unwarded).if the mage has missle and dodges its nearly impossible to kill him cuz u shoot way to slow with power bar up to half.(maxxed coord and bow skill)but as of the nov event it seems bow is the only thing ill be able to use now cuz the mages in the game didnt like the phatom ua.well a good high lvl mage could still stand there and heal before unless u critted a few times in a row.and now i just tried a weeping ua hit for 5 points of dam with a target imped and vulned WHAT A JOKE!and phatom of coarse is nerfed. once again melee takes it in the balls!!!!!!!
well ive been paying for this game since nov of 2000 and am pretty much done with the it now! finally gettin good at pking and now back to square one.i have a very high lvl mage and choose to use my archer/ua because its diff. not the same old boring mage battles which plague the game pvp.
a long time ac'er and its time to say goodbye! world of warcraft or everquest 2 time.

DwynnsPlace

11-12-2004, 09:50 AM

Hello all! Great days at AC.

Just a couple blurbs and I will have to go change a couple diapers.

1} Creatures with magic are great, especially if they can cast a whole range of magic. Imagine a pack of Drudges with a shamin casting heal on the other drudges! Sweet!

If you have to boost the Players abilities then why not tweek the monsters.

2} If a weeping weapon can get major bonuses fighting humans then those pesky bandits should quiver and run when they see this weapon comming at them!

They are human after all. (wink)

3} Salvaging is a great skill and if you are going to have a salvage tinker, then create Smelters in towns were you can get top quality salvage bags returned for raw salvaged ore bags players turn in to smeltor/ salvage tinker.

After all someone is going to start that buisness and it might as well be done right. Small cheap towns, like the beginner towns, will produce lower quality salvage, say "5". Where as Moderate towns with no local starter or training hall might produce salvage from their smelters at a "7" quality. An Isolater town like Aran Bakur might produce Top Quality "9" Ore but only from Bags of at least a "7" quality. I would sugest that there must be at least a 2 point varience between Raw ore bags players turn in and finished Salvage Bags players recieve from Smeltors. Note: it may be possible to take salvaged ore "up the tree" so to speek, and get higher quality ore from each of the ascending town smeltors but one should not expect to get full bags of "7" salvage from full bags of "5" raw Ore. I would suggest a 50% loss on trade in.

Example:
1 full (100%) bag of quality "5" raw Ore is taken to the Lytelthorpe smeltor. The smeltor is given the Bag and 500 Pyreal (his fee) [Optional].

The smeltor returns a (50%) smelted bag of "7" quality salvage to the player.

The player adds this to another bag of "7+" quality ore he saved from before and now has a (100%) bag of salvage. He can opt to use the full bag to modify an item or he can go to Aran bakur's smeltor and have the salvage tinker smelt the (100%) "7" quality salvage and produce a (50%) "9" quality bag for a fee of ...say... $5000 Pyreals. (fee) [optional]
.................................................. .................................................. ....

This has it's benefits and seems like it might work well.
Suggestion, Either build smeltors in towns with little activity or in towns with the greatest activity.

DwynnsPlace......................Happy Gaming All!
AKA Jessibellyshaker (Playing sence 2000)