Let us know what you think of the topics In Development.

[Ibn]

Please use this thread to give us your feedback on the additional In Development topics (http://ac.turbinegames.com/index.php?page_id=224).

Please note that there is a separate thread to answer the questions we asked about allegiance gatherings, you can find that thread here (http://forums.ac.turbinegames.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=6366).

[Bhodi Amashi]

The allegiance account boot/ban is long overdue...but most welcome nonetheless!

As a word of warning, current monarchs must be very, very, very careful as to who they appoint as an officer.

[zathros]

I frequently cast Futility on high health monsters, and depending upon the situation, Broadside of the Barn and Hamfistedness. If level 7 creature spells were reduced to 2 minute duration, I would be negatively impacted. I am expecting to use dispell spells to deal with creature spells, so they won't be as bad as they used to.

Other than that I like the debuff changes.

[Myk]

Projectile Physics
Another issue that we’ve seen for ranged weapon users is that their projectiles are quite narrow. For example, the size of the physics object on an arrow is currently about the circumference of the shaft. It is fairly easy for monsters or other players to dodge incoming attacks by moving a very small distance.

We are investigating increasing the size of projectile physics objects to make these attacks hit more frequently. We do not expect this change to be very large, but it should improve the ability of Bow, Crossbow, and Thrown Weapons users to physically hit their target. For example, we are considering increasing the size of the physics object on an arrow to be about the circumference of the base of the arrowhead. This would approximately double the width of the physics object. The calculations of evading due to Missile Defense will not be changed.

PLEASE test this to make sure its cuts down the zxc twitch by atleast 75% Arrows miss by a good distance and increasing the area of impact to twice its size might not be enough.

[Nya13]

Allegiance Tools : I like it But if it could come out to April.

Allegiance BindStones and Ranged Attack Changes :
It sound good, Waiting to see ho wit will work in game.

[knopp]

1. Will multiple spells of the same kind overwrite? IE: If I get 3 war inept 6's, will there only be the latest one left? Or do I have to dispell all 3 still?

2. Towns? Why would you want to bring people back to towns? Let the towns crumble and die and let NEW towns grow where the people are. You know, like it does in the real world.

3. Archers. Hrmpf. A level 80 archer does more damage than a lvl 126 mage already in pvm, but to make them more viable in pvp, you are going to make them even MORE powerful? When you can make an equasion that somehow states that having 1/2 the total xp should make them more powerful than a lvl 126 mage. Then I will accept it, till then, no soup for archers.

4. Heal spells. Nice, but the average doesnt really change much on the high end, so this will effect uppers little. The dbuff timers will probably be really nice. I can just see sword inepting in PK now, where the guy just runs for 2 mins till his stuffs gone, and hits you with his weeping and killer damage bonus on your 4 minute life vuln.

5. WHY HAS NOTHING BEEN DONE ABOUT CREDIT BALANCE YET? Are you going to ignore it like xp chains and macroing for 3 years before you suddenly do something about it? Or are you going to admit that you lack the programming talent to actually fix the problem, like you did with animation breaks (fastcasting)?

I think the answer to this one is the most important. Why? Cause it is the one that is making you lose the most people!

Thanks,
Knopp

[Blushtusker]

WOOT cant see anything wrong on this future upcoming changes.

If you could choose between gathering at your mansion and gathering in town, and both were an equally easy recall, where would you gather?

:D :D iiiiiiii want both, great Idea.

[Mc Que]

Ranged weapons atm on the bar go from -50% to +50%. You say your going to change to -40% to +50%.

Ummm why?

Atm I am maxed bow/coord with majors coord & bow & still have to set my bar nearly all the way up to hit things that are level 110+.

Heck I have to set my bar in middle just to hit monsters in the level 70 range.

How would going to -40% to +50% change anything?

Wanna make a good change then change monsters back to thier missle d before it was upped last year.

[Unsi]

You guys have come up with some really cute ideas this time. Well thought out, and for the most part, quite handy. My only question would be....
Don't you think that level 80 characters would need pyreal scarabs? Most of my level 50'ish mages are casting 6's, I would think pyreals might be needed. Also, It would be neat if you traded coins for prismatic tapers. Tapers run out really easily on lil guys, and a few tapers here and there couldn't hurt. I am sure the DT noobs would love it, even though I don't play that world. It must be hard to comp up in such a disaggreeable world.

[Merubin]

Some of that stuff looks like good changes!

A question though about the treasure changes, why add items like treated healing kits? The old ones worked well enough, and there were quests that had rewards (I have more than a lifetime's worth of treateds from the pincers & any vapor hearts/yellow jewels I find) that you'll be making partially useless this way for anyone who hunts higher level monsters. But I guess that could be a good thing, I'll have more mule space after dumping those kits :)

Same goes for mana stones, new potions, etc.. the old higher end ones all seemed powerful enough in my opinion

Nice to see you guys making peas easy to gather again, won't feel as if I have to hoard everything in the loot to buy plats or trade for them :)

"Negative Creature spells can be particularly annoying when cast by creatures, and do not directly increase damage when cast by players"

Hrm. Sounds good I guess, but for those who have to creature debuff monsters to hit them or similar this could be very irritating having to redo them over again for bigger fights. My mage has a low creature skill (compared to his 449 war), and when there are VoD monsters I feel the need to yield I guess I wouldn't bother anymore with this change and just cast a bunch more wars.

Looking forward to using a bindstone & the heal self changes :)

[Mr_Fred]

I just want to say:

Love the Allegiance changes...long over due on the ban/boot.

I'd want to be the first to use the binding stones! I love the idea of Allegiances having "towns" to frequent. I think it would make for some great multi allegiance interaction.

Missle stuff looks great...but PLEASE for the love of god...TEST THIS EXTENSIVELY

Spell timers on Debuff look like they are starting to even out nicely. Will have to debuff more often, but it's annoying getting those spells casted on you and have them last stupidly long.

Will be sad to see the Pyreal pea stop dropping off of monsters...
I think it will be for the better though.




oh and PS. Keep up with this in development stuff...THIS is what will bring players back to the game. You guys can really say "Turbine: Powered by it's fans" and be truthful about it.

[Silik]

I have to say that I don't like the debuff changes. I
often end up debuffing things with 6s, simply because I've
got too many things on me to kill them all in the 4 minutes.
8 minute debuffs let me live through the spells, because
with WMI, focus and self 6 debuffs on critters, they land
much less frequently. Dropping these from 8 minutes to 2
minutes, I'll get through debuffing the things, and have
to debuff them all over again! 2 minutes is not enough
time for any of the 5k+ mobs, expecially when they come in
groups. Please rethink this.. with dispells being
increasingly easier to come by, I don't think this is
necessary, but even if you think it is, please let it work
that way only when cast /on/ the players.

[DraconisUmbra]

Omg color me shocked. I actually like all of the suggestions listed in the in development follow-up they all sound great.

[Stalifan_HG]

What do the addition of new healing, stamina, and mana potions mean with respect to alchemy? Are they going to be greater than the trade elixirs? Will new alchemy items be added if they are? Just concerned what the value of my trade health elixir business will be if they get nerfed by easy to find better items.

[knopp]

and the alchemy macros are now scared...

[Myrrdhin]

Towns have long needed a few changes, for one, to make them slightly more useful, other than a place to sell loot or buy comps, beyond that there has been a serious drop in the Player interaction in or with towns, in my opinion.

Availabilities of town supplies, be it comps, or anything else the players may seek in a town, I think, should be based on the amount of Player-NPC Commerce that takes place, as well as the towns treasury being limited in how much they can buy from players, i.e. if players do not buy very much from a vendor in a town, that vendor should be limited in how much they can buy from the players.

In some ways it would give more usefulness to Crafter/Trades type characters, they could craft their goods and sell to a town to build the towns stock on certain items, &c.

One thing that has always been a slight dampener for me about AC is the economy, I believe strongly in a player controlled economy, in many games of this genre.

Just my thoughts and maybe an Idea or two to think about.......

[Ibn]

Originally posted by Mc Que
Ranged weapons atm on the bar go from -50% to +50%. You say your going to change to -40% to +50%.

This change is intended primarily to improve ranged weapons in PvP. Many PK/L players always fire at fastest speed.

[Ibn]

Originally posted by Stalifan_HG
What do the addition of new healing, stamina, and mana potions mean with respect to alchemy? Are they going to be greater than the trade elixirs? Will new alchemy items be added if they are? Just concerned what the value of my trade health elixir business will be if they get nerfed by easy to find better items.

The new higher-level potions may be better than trade elixirs, but you will not be able to purchase them in shops. The only way to find them will be in loot. Trade Elixirs will still be the best potions that are easily accessible.

[knopp]

Ibn, why no comment on my post?

[Urtho]

Ibn,

Can you explain in more detail the rationale behind the critter spells being capped @ 2:00 minutes?

Other then this one thing, so far I like all the proposed changes...

Urtho

[Krazed]

good job on the patch....all the new allegiance stuff looks great

[Gordian]

Knopp... you really wonder after what you wrote? sheesh

I don't even understand your #5 comment that is allegedly so important. If you are referring to the cost of War.. *yawn* There is no issue there that has been a significant factor in people leaving the game.


Ibn,

Most of the changes look good. Allegiance tools will be very helpful. My only concern is that I have liked the casino chests as a good way of getting majors on armor and weapons. I'd hate to see that reduced but I guess it would be a boon to my mage if I found some good casters there too.

[Khorps]

The acuracy change doesn't affect me at all (TW) since I have to use full accuracy on anything 'tricky'.

A question though: Does this mean the middle (where the bar is placed by default when you log in) is still 0%, or will it be +5%?

I suppose you are testing the waters on the level 80 loot tables before showing us the proposed changes to the other levels.

[Meri]

The allegiance commands are a nice idea, but there needs to be a bit more thought put into some.

For instance, allegiance officers should not be able to use the "allegiance account boot" command. Booting one individual can be traumatic enough (explaining to their patron, their followers, etc.)... but you're booting the entire account, with no knowledge of exactly which characters are effected: "The player running this command would most likely be informed of the number of characters booted, but not their names." That's a tool that shouldn't be in the hands of anyone except the monarch.

I also don't think that allegiance officers should be able to appoint other allegiance officers. That, too, should be a monarch-only command... in my opinion.

[Rauth]

Allegiance command additions look great. The allegiance chat boot looks a bit weak, but if someone is continuously abusing the channel, they probably don't wish to be in the allegiance anyhow. The ability of all characters being booted and forbidden to swear back in adds teeth to the solution of being "kicked" from an allegiance for unacceptable behavior, so maybe it all balances after all.

I like the uniformity suggested in the Debuff spell changes. I noticed the differences in the VI and VII spells just the past week and found it distinctly annoying that a more powerful debuff lasted half the time (actually i thought it was less, but that's subjective perception for you.)

The Heal spell overhauls I like. Nothing there not to like, IMO.

I am excited about the potion additions. I hope one or more of them are craftable. Don't forget the Potion of Black Fire is already in game. As for lockpicks, I was literally just about to post a suggestion regarding this when I saw the new article but I think I will wait to see what your brainstorming sessions produce.

Projectile Physics - *goofy grin*

Scrivener revisions sound interesting.

The fact that you wanted feedback well in advance: Priceless.

[Myk]

I disagree, alleg officers should be able to appoint and romove each other. Without that then you get the same problems you get now, nobody online that can handle business. Although maybe a monarch only command something like

/Allegiance officer perms

Give perms so someone can be made an office. that way the monarch would then still control the people who could be alleg officers.

[Yew Wan Sum]

These IDEAS are great, but the execution is lacking.

Changing the accuracy from 50 to 60 at min is not sufficient. Not even close.

My archer has merely trained missle def. Its at 300 base. A mage with missle def trained can easily have over 300 buffed. My bow skill is 430. Lets say its 400. At min power, I can hit (for pathetic damage) a defence of 200 50%. 50% is not enough to even be a threat. Up goes the bar. Down goes the DoT. Still no threat. At 60% I have 240 skill. Whoopeee! Still can't hit anyone. Up goes the bar, down goes the DoT. Still no threat. Wheres the breakeven? Somewhere between 75% and 100%. At 75% 400 skill becomes 300, which is enough for 50% against 300 def, which any character can attain with ease. In fact, you can have (290+55 coord, 290+55 quick div 5 plus 55) 193 buffed without having it even trained! At 300 skill, I can hit 193 reliably at min power. I cannot do the same at 200 or 240. If someone actually *trains* missle def, then I cannot hit them reliably until 400, or 100%. This assumes that they just stand there cooperatively, of course, DONT have +missle mods(coming soon?), and DONT engage me in melee combat. (heh, I wish)

So somewhere between 75 and 100 should be the target. 75 should be the MINIMUM implementation. Work up from there. After we see the effects of the object size increase. Frankly, it will take improvements to that as well, although I am willing to wait and see if it makes any difference at all before addressing that.

As for PvM...fear not. Max accuracy is still needed for everything. If its 100+, its gotta be max. You won't be making any real impact there, *except* maybe for creatures 30-50 levels or more below the archer level, where you might be able to actually use a setting other than 'far right'. Since you get reduced XP for these anyways, I don't see any problems with it.

Here's an idea: TEST IT! Make one of your team actually play an archer on a live world for a while and see. Then make em play DT(give em a level 126 TANK archer =P) for a while to gain some xp there. Well, vitae more than xp, but at least you'd see that 60% won't do squat.


EDIT: The other ideas all look pretty good, and I'll wait to see their effect before passing judgement on those, but I think they will turn out fine. One exception: For level *6* loot, for the love of Asheron, please put plats in the possible drop list.

[drakkonbane]

Most of the stuff stounds pretty good, though a few might change gameplay in directions that you havn't considered yet. Before I start, though, I want to say that this method of introducing changes and getting so much player feedback is amazing. Ibn is getting something of a cult following on boards. Great job you guys (and gals). :)


1) Allegiance tools: Really good changes here, but while you're at it, is the functionality there to add commands basically opposite to account ban etc? For example, a command that allows all characters of a certain account to access the allegiance chat, even when not sworn to anyone? Or allows non-allegiance characters of one account access to the villa/mansion (bypass house restrictions, not access to storage, which I think is already functional). Just some suggestions. =)

2) Bindstones: Just an idea, but perhaps make a quest that the monarch has to go on, at the end of which he can choose to tie himself to one bindstone? It's already very easy to move around Dereth, and you know that most monarchs would simply choose hard-to-reach places like eastham, so members of that allegiance would get around even more conveniently. Make 'em work for their rewards. =)

3) sounds good, but the person above who mentioned pyreal scarabs and prismatic tapers was right. Also, I'm not so sure adding treated kits to random loot is a great idea - they are supposed to be a little harder to get, because they're pretty good...

4) Ranged attacks: good, the width of the arrowhead makes sense. Although, maybe a smooth transition from -40% to +50% would be wierd, because the exact middle wouldn't be 0% anymore. That would throw a number of people off. Is it possible to keep 0% as the middle, and increase 1% of to hit bonus per 1% moved to the right, while decreasing 4/5% hit bonus per 1% moved to the left?

5) Spell timers: This is the one that worries me the most. Negetive spells cast on players is easy to handle with the abundance dispell gems, so I think this would effect the gameplay in ways that you didn't intend. For starters, it would drastically reduce the effectiveness of creature magic in pvm. A magic yield that only lasts for two minutes? It can take longer than that to just land a spell on some bigger baddies in VoD and such, or Gaerlan. Also, lower levels or people just moving into a higher area would have a tough time - When I was in my 20's hunting idols, it took anywhere from 3-5 minutes to kill just one, far longer than your proposed buff times. If I had to continually recast frailty and whatever that spell is that reduces health regain, it would have been even harder. Finally, it would reduce the challange on places like veyesan and AL. Part of why the xp payoff is so good in those places is because the debuffs that are inevitably cast on you complement the fauna. If you effectively cut the length of these dubuffs in half, you simply discourage people from hunting anything but tuskers even more. The healing spell changes look good though. =)

Thanks for taking the time to read this! You guys rock!

[knopp]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Gordian
[B]Knopp... you really wonder after what you wrote? sheesh

I don't even understand your #5 comment that is allegedly so important. If you are referring to the cost of War.. *yawn* There is no issue there that has been a significant factor in people leaving the game.


Yes, as a matter of fact I do expect a reply. It was a post with valid questions/comments and deserves as much of an answer as any other post on this forum.

He asked for feedback, and I gave it to him. Just because he may not like it, he should still do SOMETHING.

I didn't see him denying anything I posted. Maybe I hit a real nerve instead of the usual "OMG! MAKE ME MORE LEET PLZ!" posts that abound on these boards.

If Me wanting balance in a game makes me the bad guy, then oh well...

[KirillHuntersun]

Knopp: I'd imagine because of the vast arrogance displayed in your post, not to mention the heavy bias in favor of your preferred type of character; ie mages.

Given that an archer doesn't come close to matching War damage without adding Life Magic into the mix, your "no soup for archers" whine was particularly pointless. War handily outdamages Bow with rending devices used by both skills.

I'll agree on your skill credit balance issues. Life is far too overpowered in comparison to it's most common alternative at the same credit price, which is MeleeD.

Ibn, love all of the changes, with a wistful regret for the exception of the Critter debuff timers.

If you can make it apply ONLY to spells cast on PCs, and not those cast on NPCs/Creatures, then it would work. But you're going to singlehandedly cripple some of the smaller VoD fellows with this change, not to mention make a large number of quests significantly more difficult for small parties. Creature debuffs are a fairly integral part of the high-end hunting dynamics these days, and reducing them all to a max 2 minutes is going to have a major negative impact on the player base. If anything, you're "nerfing" the wrong debuff skill.

I'm also assuming here that the archery changes are slow and cautious because they're primarily preliminary changes. I truly doubt that simply doubling the target size of an arrow, when the current size is the size of the shaft, is going to have any real effect on PvP. It's almost guaranteed to have little to no effect on PvM. If it's preliminary, that's great, and most people will be willing to give you a chance to evaluate the change, but you don't mention whether or not this is the end-point or the standard "we're going slow so we don't have to nerf later".

[Karem Darsun]

Nice ideas mostly.

My only worries are in scale not concept.

I like the idea of the officers and especially the idea of officers being able to appoint others. I'm not sure how this would work in practice, but it would be nice if an alliegence had officers spread over the timezones, and as one goes off, they can pass the authority to another.

I do worry about the impact of reducing the critter debuff times on VOD, Caul and Boss hunts, guess i'll have to wait and see. Have to like the rest. While the 6's offered a nice alternative before, you have to wonder why a lower level spell lasts 2-3 times as long.

The heal change is nice, but probably not enough to wean me off of stam to health, the stam regain isnt enough of a change either. With 450 stam, it takes me 4 or 5 spells to refill my stam pool completely this way. After the changes, it will still take me 4-5 spells to refil it, *shrugs*.

The rest? All good stuff, like the treasure changes, be good to see the new toys.

[Kyllyr]

Allegiance commands:

I truely like the idea of officers. In the allegiance I am in the monarch has becoming almost a legend. I mean that in the sense that he hardly has time to log on, and other allegiance members have taken over everything. However we do not have access to the monarch commands.

I can envision a case where a monarch quits, leaving the monarchy with the choice to elect a new monarch, or not have access to all those commands. With the new allegiance officers having all the powers, it would be possible for people to keep the Monarch and just go on.

The allegaince account boot, I think the person should be able to see the names affected before conducting the boot. It will be easy enough to figure out what the names are after the boot.

I think the allegaince chat kick should also have a timer like /a boot someone 120. Where 120 is minutes. Possibly limiting the boot to 2 hours max.

I have been wating for the storage change. I loot tremendous amounts of stuff I want to make available to allegiance members; however it was just such a pain. Now I will be able to.

Bind Stone:

Our monarchy has several bufff bots at the mansion. Those of us just hanging out hang out at the mansion inorder to watch what is going on.

We can see if somone is repeatedly buffing, which indicates they are having trouble. Then we can offer assistance.

Also by being at the mansion we can conviently answer any questions that people want to ask while they are buffing, without burdening everyone with spam on the /a channel.

It is also a good place to leave a character "parked" while going AFK. when you return you can scan the chat and then PM or /a answers to anyone who asked anything, whithout the burden of reading through a bunch of junk form non allegiance members.

It would be nice to see there be a reason to hang out in the towns again, but I do not look forwrd to spending hours trying to buy a cracked shard again. ;) I wish you luck with this, but I think the marketplace killed all chance of towns ever regaining there popularity. The people who liked to hang out in towns, all hang out in the marketplace now.

All the other changes:

I have no opinion on them.

[Jas-of-HG]

Looks good overall.

I'm not sure I follow the logic, though, of reducing critter spells to 2 minutes. I like the chart for item & life, I think you should be consistent across all three schools.

Healing spells DEFFINATELY need some love... I don't think you're being aggressive enough! More, please!

I think the idea of finding a plate in the casino chest is a bit of a nerf... I know people who really like the casino pulls just the way they are. Me, I don't gamble, but some people are not going to be happy with the goblet they get.

Missile changes look solid.

[EvilElvis]

The entire slider would then scale evenly from -40% to +50%
*SIGH*

Please, just remove the accuracy bar altogether and replace it with a damage bar.

[Sigma]

Distribution of mundane items – see Treasure Revisions above – will be based on the level of the town’s surrounding content. The greater the level of the town’s surrounding content, the better the items that the vendors will sell.



I'm not particularly fond of this idea...as said in the LTTP, the higher level towns will be drastically changed for a higher cost, no? Well...that means that any time that we'd like to get something from the shops that we want, we'll have to pay a helluva lot more for them...not really all that fond of it...AT ALL :)


Secondly, the loot changes to the 80+ gen...

Is that they give up to gold peas...it's basically completely ignoring that anyone 80+ would have to atleast cast 6's to do any good...good luck going anywhere that you'd need to go at 80+ with 5's....I don't even want to imagine how much you'd be making out with that lifestone...So, I'm thinking a smaller chance to get pyreal would be nice....maybe like 1/8th that of gold? Not enough to make a gigantic profit off of, merely enough to get enough pyreal scarabs to come somewhere near splitting even...(Because let's face it, pyreal scarabs burn like gasoline coated oil rag, drenched in ethanol.... :) )

[lop-ibn-sung]

I would rather see healing spells more like the Virindi and the Shadows.

You know the ones where you have them down to about 25 health and they regain about 250+....yeah, give me some of that!

[Dat]

Allegiance Tools : very nice. Acct. boot/ban and chat boot very very helpful!

bindstones : separate feedback thread

Treasure Revisions: Okay I already hate this and it's not even finished yet! I've picked up nothing but worthless **** since the changes were implemented...which is ridiculous for a level 115 toon but oh well. And, there isnt a corresponding XP reaping benefit to compensate. Question: Are pyreal peas considered not "mundane"? Will pyreal peas still drop and what will drop them if so? Dropping of Platinum Scarab peas would rock. Given the plethora of level VII scrolls dropping...reducing the cost of plats and making them more available in terms of dropping would make more sense.

Ranged Attack : Bow LOVE! :) :) :) :) Me happy!

negative spell timers and healing/revite spells: makes sense finally. good job!

[B]Town Revisions : Some of these dont make a whole lot of sense to me, but I have no issue with them. Distribution of appropriate level items makes sense and would be more consistent. As for the scrivener changes...would they be selling spells consistent with surrounding area? and, if so where would v's and vi's be sold. Furthermore, would (and where) scriveners be selling level vii's (although given the current drop rate on vii's buying them would be a waste)?

Overall nice job guys...you're overwhelming with the flood of changes and ideas that brimming forth! It's putting some life back into the game...even if I dont always agree/like the changes in and of themselves...it's good to see some real development going on!

[Jaspo]

Please make the Stamina2Mana/Revitalize combo work for new mages.

Revitalize is a very underused spell as it is. Melee and archer are most likely going to chug an elixer rather than switch to a wand. They could quite possibly die if they tried ;-P

Mages on the otherhand use revitalize as a mana regenerator. But under level 30 it was impossible to get the combo to work with any level of efficiency. It would be nice if low level mages could benefit from the same mechanic that high level mages do.

You should also take a look at drain stamina. But not necessarily the spell. The level of stamina in low level creatures could be doubled thereby making drain stamina/stamina to mana much more viable for the low level mage.

I did some experimenting on drudge slaves with a level 12 mage. It took two drains to fill my stamina, the stamina to man would simply not provide me with enough mana to continue. The creature would no longer return a usable amount stamina. I would be forced to drink an elixer.

Not that drinking elixers is bad. It is much more interactive and exciting to battle as mage without having to chug.

[Flynn]

Originally posted by lop-ibn-sung
I would rather see healing spells more like the Virindi and the Shadows.

You know the ones where you have them down to about 25 health and they regain about 250+....yeah, give me some of that!
They don't use heal (well, not all the time anyway), they use mana/stam to health. Try it at level 4/5 when you're on full stamina, it more or less instantly restores all your health. I always use S2H when I need a quick heal, and revit when the danger's passed.

[Ibn]

Originally posted by Urtho
Ibn,

Can you explain in more detail the rationale behind the critter spells being capped @ 2:00 minutes?

Other then this one thing, so far I like all the proposed changes...

Urtho

It's to cut down on the annoyance when a creature casts a creature debuff on you. If you don't have any dispels, your combat ability may be crippled for the full length of the debuff. This is unlike a vuln or brittlemail where you still have your combat ability, but are being hit for more damage.

[Bake_Neko]

About the critter debuff only lasting 2 min
---

It would be harder for mages hunting big-games when their yield will not last the whole combat.

Also make the mage less useful in group if their melee-d/missile-d debuff goes away so fast.

Not to mention that some people uses inepts in fight.

L6 had longer duration, some mages too advantage for that.

I would like this kept as it is. And I am not even a mage.

[Batu Tenjin]

I like the ideas as a whole.

The allegiance changes are greatly needed.

The debuff changes make sense, and, as a melee who hunts with very little magic use, having those level 6s wear of in a reasonable amount of time is a winner.

The treasure revisions seems to be a good move forward towards a better (i.e. not totally nerfed like February) treasure structure. I am curious about the new elixirs, however, and wonder why you sort of snuck that fact into a Mundane Loot spawn table, instead of heralding it in an announcement, or even discussing it in an In Development post. I can only hope they are some very interesting ideas.

The Ranged Attack changes also seems, on its face, to be a good idea. The only potential downside (and one I don't care about) is whether or not it overbalances archers in PvP play.

More good ideas and more great communication from Turbine. Way to go!

[_DOT_1_2_3_4_5_]

Love the ranged weapon improvement... very frustrating to be standing in front of something and missing when you know it is an impossibility.

Really looking forward to the change in negative spell timer ... never seemed fair that 6's were soooooooooo looooooooooong

[Setolc]

[i]Currently there is a disparity in the length of negative spells across different levels. Level VI negative spells last for 8 minutes, while level VII negative spells only last for 4 minutes. We’d like to change all negative spells...[/B]

Actually I think that the duration for negative spells should all be increased.

In my opinion, the 4 minutes for a level 7 debuff is a joke for PvM you can typically fight through these spells and be just fine.

Back in the old days when the debuffs lasted as long as the buff spells, I remember having to sit out and wait for spells to fall off before re-engaging.

I am not suggesting such a thing, but recommend increasing the debuff to at least 10 minutes for level 7 spells.

This will also add to the power of the dispell gems or potions -- or preferably having the ability to cast a level 7 cleanse spell (if they are added to the game).

[Silifi Of Death]

Want to revitalize towns?

BURN THE MARKETPLACE

It's the only way you can do it.

Of course, then people would hang out in the subway again..

So infest the Subway with Swarm Mutilators!

Yep... You'll **** some people off, but they'll be in towns.

Also, don't make New stones.. just give monarchs an extra LS tie. I have a very nice place that should be a meeting area, but you probably won't add a Bindstone there...

[Yew Wan Sum]

Ug, just read the recovery changes in detail.

Once again. Concept = Good. Execution = Lacking.

7.5 more points?? Is this supposed to change anything? How about you do this(for health):

Make it so that when I am protected by a Level X spell, and I am subject to a Level X vuln, and then hit with a Level X war, a Level X heal will restore the same range of damage.

Substitute level 1-7 for X.

i.e. Heal Self X range = War X range.

If you really *must* have some diminishing return thing to make heal self less effective at recovery than war is at damage( I can see arguments for and against both having valid points), then use a 10% reduction from War X range, across the board.

I see no reason to limit stam recovery in this manner.

First: Pick a variance. Why is L1 different from L7? I suggest 50%

Second: Stam Max = 30 * Spell Level.

L1 = 15-30 like you have it
L7 = 105-210 with 157 avg.

The whole range is defined nicely that way, and it provides more of an effective difference than your currently proposed method. At least it has a *chance* of being noticable.

Even better would be a 33% variance:

L1 = 20-30
L7 = 140-210 with 175 avg.

Now THIS would be a noticable improvement that might actually lessen the number of casts required to refill. Not every time, but a noticable number of times.

Just something to consider.

[KirillHuntersun]

Originally posted by Ibn
It's to cut down on the annoyance when a creature casts a creature debuff on you. If you don't have any dispels, your combat ability may be crippled for the full length of the debuff. This is unlike a vuln or brittlemail where you still have your combat ability, but are being hit for more damage.


Um, pardon me for pointing out the obvious on this one, Ibn, but if you're worried about the players' annoyance factor with having their skills be non-viable for the duration of the critter debuffs, then why don't you just make the baddies cast them less often?

Even the plan you have in place for Life magic would work in that regard; half the problem is War or Life Inept 6 from a half-dozen critters out there, all of which last 8 minutes. Bring that down to 3:30, and a lot of the issue goes away. ESPECIALLY if they're less likely to cast debuffs anyhow.

This would be FAR better than officially and effectively nerfing Yield/Baffle/Feeblemind, as well as War/Life Inept, something that a LOT of mages use to make their own War, Life, and Magic Defense more effective on the big nasties.

EDIT: I would also like to say that I REALLY REALLY like Yew Wan Sum's proposal for tweaking out the Revit/Heal spells. Right now, you've given us no reason to use Heal Self over Stam to Health, at any level. And Revit is just too weak for an environment almost totally populated by individuals with high health.

This would also have an effect in speeding up buffing, as well.

[Silik]

Originally posted by Ibn
It's to cut down on the annoyance when a creature casts a creature debuff on you. If you don't have any dispels, your combat ability may be crippled for the full length of the debuff. This is unlike a vuln or brittlemail where you still have your combat ability, but are being hit for more damage.

But it increases the annoyance of having to cast the same spells many times. And actually increases the damage you take, because it's going to take longer to kill things (cast multiple copies of a debuff) or will allow hits through that wouldn't have previously.

I don't think the benefit for critter-cast spells outweighs the detrimental effects on player-cast spells. If you can't have critters and players spells act differently, leave it the way it is. Level 7s were reduced in time because players had (at the time) no way to remove them. Now that players are getting ways to remove them, I'd actually prefer upping the time of 7s to lowering the time of all the others. I often need the longer debuffs, and have to switch to 6s for the time.

[GKusnick]

Any chance that the bindstones will be usable by unpledged characters? In other words, is the purpose of bindstones to reward people for joining an allegiance by giving them two more recalls than unpledged characters have? Or is it to encourage people to spend more time in town by giving them an easy way to get there without spending a portal or lifestone recall slot on it? If it's the latter, then giving unpledged characters equal access to this feature seems fair and sensible.

[Soter]

wow ty so much for the extra 7.5hp avg per heal, im sure that will save everyone from death.

[BraxisPragueHG]

THe Creature debuff timer reduced to 2 minutes thats just silly. I mean Creature debuffs help you do more damage. AR weapons are based on opponents skill if you debuff their melee and missle along with coord and wuick you do more damage. Why not instead of making the timers shorter but making the creatures understand this logic more? As a Mage I see this as a nerf not as Mage love like we need.

[Madgic]

Hiya all.

I like what i see. For a few months now there have been some real troubles in the game as far as developement goes, however im seeing a real forward motion begining to happen.

I think maybe there should be some revisions over an above the Bow accuracy options you have proposed but any move forward is a move forward we wil see how this works.

And please publish a table so these silly mages that keep spamming about mages hitting for less than bow and less than swordies can see that either they are gimped to hell or just dont know what they are talking about. Every Post I look at always has some mage piping up about how he/she is not able to hit as hard as anyone else LOL. Turbine admitted themselves that the mage is a stronger character than any other, and that war hits harder than any other, and anyone who plays both mages and melees/archers Knows this. Melee and Archer characters deserve some love so when they get it allow them to enjoy it.

[Kachina]

Does the character creation screen supposed to have any value at all? Xbow is 6 to train, and spec, the and 8 for bow. These skills are already grossly overpowered if the creation values are supposed to mean anything. Xbow is so overpowered many of the bow characters dropped bow and spec-ed xbow in my clan. If the character creation screen is meaning less, then no longer nerf mages who have to spend 28 to spec war. Maybe you should use the Dungeon Siege character creation, where every one starts the same, and skill builds with weapon of choice use.
I currently play a:

lvl 58 archer
43 UA
111 sword
84 war mage

I have been playing for over 3 years, and to see archery get so far out of balance is very disturbing. Now you are making it even further out of balance. Not good.

[Heideggar]

2 min on creature inepts?

Why not 30 seconds?

Why have them at all? Some people take a bit longer than 2 minutes to kill some things.

10-20 lvl 7 war bolts * 3-4 seconds to cast ~ 1 minute of casting straight wars. Throw in resists, any healing, etc. and you're looking at more debuffs being cast more frequently to achieve the same level of effectiveness. More debuffs = more plat burn, and with the current system, that's not too bright.

If you're worried about 2 min of creature inepts on a player, that's supreme BS. Debuffs promote a difficult environment. That's what makes some areas tougher than others. Maybe you guys have really bad communication problems with one another? Maybe you guys don't play Asheron's Call?

People just fight through debuffs. It's wastefull to stop at all because of inepts. The current setup of inept timers was pretty damn good from my point of view. Some creatures you might have to cast debuffs twice to finally take down, but that was understandable for the level of difficulty of the creature. Lowering the timer to 2 minutes when it takes people longer to even kill things their level is rather dull. Why not make vulns last 2 minutes too? I mean, there are people who can't fight creatures because they hurt them too much with vulns, right? Why not hold their hand with your maxed out Dev character, geez.

You should go read the LttP some time. I hear they are allowing for stackable stillness gems, dispell potions, awakener, dispell spells, etc.

You can't honestly tell me it's already difficult to dispell spells, then say it's annoying with these advanced improvments to all classes to dispell spells. That's BS.

Most people can make a couple hundred dispell potions in a couple days. Takes little time to do that. Great for heavy magic people. I can get 10-12 large mnemosynes a buff around the cathedral with a low level archer (50+). Or how about pincers? Yellow triangles?

I've got packs of dispell gems, friends do too. It's not that there's a problem with the debuffs/inepts lasting too long on people, it's that they don't know, or are too lazy, to get a means of dispelling the debuffs. So, they come here and complain.

[Evangeline]

I think the spell components selection for the 80+ should include pyreal peas and individual platinum scarabs. As it is, I only pick up the peas that drop to sell. It would be nice to pick up components to burn too. :cool:

Allegiance changes sound great. A fellowship quest to tie to those bindstones would be even more nice(since it does benefit the whole group). I've never really had problems with having to ban people or accounts, but it sounds like a much needed feature for large groups.

As far as the officer's powers, please leave the ability to nominate or remove another officer to the monarch only.

[Number-Sun]

I like the changes. Especially like the allegiance stuff.

Creature Debuff spells changing to 2 minutes is fine by me. I expect the Creature spec'd toons may object though.

Glad to see the Life Vi debuff times adjusted.

Healing and Revit upgrades are appreciated. Doesn't appear to be a drastic change though. Maybe that can be massaged after you see the impact.

Ranged attack doesn't seem to need improving but I'm sure they will appreciate the help. Why not improve on some of the less used weapons as incentive for people to be something other than bow/xbow, mage or sword.

Treasure - new mana charges/potions, health potions and treated health kits are appreciated.
Maybe we can see plats and/or plat peas drop some day :eek: I know the economy would fluctuate but it would be a meaningful change.

[Ashake_MT]

Bindstones: Great idea, as long as mansion-holding allegiances are not "punished" for having a mansion. We already pay a premium for the privilege of having a mansion - why should we be denied this ability?

Meeting places: Wherever members congregate is where we get together :) If a couple are at the Rith lifestone talking for example, and others portal in, you're bound to see a small gathering at that location.

Allegiance changes: Wow, you guys IMHO are blowing it with the allegiance officer thing. First off - I do not feel that officers should be able to remove/appoint themselves. This should be a position bestowed by the monarch - not because JoeBlow wants his buddy as an officer, rather than the one the monarch decided upon. I understand that many allegiances have nearly absentee monarchs - and this can be a problem. But I don't feel this is the answer in its entirety. My suggestion would be to remove that aspect of your proposed changes - the selection of officers should fall to the monarch - nobody else. Not only that - but it could become VERY confusing for allegiance members if officers can remove/appoint at will. Stability in the "chain of command" is important in ANY allegiance - this could potentially create chaos.

The allegiance account ban is something that will help almost all of us prevent thieves from entering our allegiances. I am under the assumption that once this ban was in place, it would continue even if the original toon named was deleted (as it is in the /squelch command). The allegiance account boot will also be most helpful in that respect.

Allegiance chat kick is something I've wished we had since you implemented that feature. Some people like to use it as their personal broadcast arena, much to the annoyance of other allegiance members. We've had many of our members turn allegiance chat off - which prevents us from communicating with them without direct tells. Perhaps implementation of this feature will encourage them to turn it back on :)

And while you are fixing all this stuff .... would you mind allowing monarchs to address the allegiance AS a monarch? It's always annoying to have people report that it comes across as an allegiance SPEAKER ... when you're the monarch. We got demoted when you changed the allegiance annuoncements several months back ... would be nice to be seen as the monarch again in announcements :D

[Urtho]

Well after I've had a chance to think about, it, I can honestly say I don't care for the change to the duration of the critter debuff. I can see where it might be somewhat useful for melee's to have the debuffs cast on them go away quicker, however...

- With the fixed dispells, most peeps will use a potion/gem/spell to get rid of debuffs they are concerned about.

- Most peeps I know, consider their active skill, to be at the debuffed amount. Since getting debuffed by most higher level creatures is pretty much a given.

- As a critter spec mage, this kind of nerfs my abilities. In groups, not so much, because creatures (except boss mobs) rarely live longer then a few seconds. But during solo play, heavy duty critters can cause fights lasting well over 2 minutes. I rely on yields, and other debuffs to allow my lower skills to function. IOW: A long fight just got longer and possibly more difficult.



Summary: Keep the critter debuffs the same, or make them equal to the proposed life/item changes.

Urtho

[Lorelii_HG]

i love the proposed changes, i think the loot changes are right on and the town revisions sound great

the negative spells changes are MUCH needed :)

[BillBraskey]

PLEASE, PLEASE do not make player casted critter debuff spells last only 2 minutes. At least 3 minutes is needed so we can take down monsters we yield.

edit: everything else seems good. the revit/heal changes could be more drastic. But every little bit helps, and maybe after seeing how it goes they can be upped more. Or lvl 8 spells can be added. It's a bit of a drag when your health keeps going up after u can cast lvl 7's but the ammount you can heal for stays the same. Having really high health would be much more effective if the heal spells were also more efffective.

[Dj_Viper]

-Good move on the Revitilize and heal spells. The current revit spells are ridiculous, I think they should go up even more =).

-Projectile changes also look good, bows are underpowered.

-Spell Components: I loved the fact that some monster dropped pyreal scarabs...that shouldn't be removed. Sometimes it is nice to find a useful component on a monster.

-Bindstones: I know there is another post for this but I don't have time to wait for the five minute timer to post again...Being from Darktide my bindstone opinion would be slightly altered. I love the fact of another place to recall to. Although I can't see many people hanging out in towns in darktide (because you would be killed), I have a feeling it would give something for monarchies to fight over which is badly needed. Maybe monarchies would fight over bindstones just like they used to fight for dungeons...that would be awesome =).

There's my two cents.

[Heideggar]

lol, read your heal self and the revite changes.


If you wanna waste your time, do it. Seriously, that's a big waste of time for 4-7.5 more health.

80-135 hp, that's nice, but I get hit for 170-190 from a war spell, and if you played AC those mystics cast those wars mad fast.

4-7.5 health is probably good for the very extremem low levels, but when you get past lvl 20, 4-7.5 health isn't a big deal when you have 150-350 health needing to restore HUNDREDS of health. 7.5 is small potatoes, thus, a waste of time.

My mage can heal from 100 health at about 70% success rate. He's got 320 health. He won't heal for a full 220, but he does for 50-150 each time. Healing is fast, ti works, and doesn't use my mana like healing does.


Same can be said for your revitalizing changes. How much return do you expect people to get back from the ~8 points of stamina?

These things are nice, but if it's gonna take more then 10-20 minutes to do, don't. Fix something important.

[Meri]

One more thing... would it be possible to have "moderators" for allegiance chat in addition to "officers"? It would be so useful to be able to appoint certain members that could use the "kick" command when someone's chat got out of hand. That way monarchs could choose (maybe 5 or 6??) responsible people that are online at various times of the day and can moderate the channels for any infractions. Usually, if corrected a few times, people start paying attention to "rules" or find another allegiance. :)

[Heideggar]

"Distribution of mundane items – see Treasure Revisions above – will be based on the level of the town’s surrounding content. The greater the level of the town’s surrounding content, the better the items that the vendors will sell."

Most of the stuff I buy from vendors I buy in mediocre towns. Will I need to buy my slash, pierce, and bludge arrowheads in high priced towns then?

Will this be exclusive to your new items? Just trying to get a feel of what could potentially be a huge money sink for people.

[Holey]

I've got to agree about the healing changes needing further improvement.

They should be the equivalent to an (unvulned) war of the same level. If I can hit for 180 max, I should be able to heal for the same amount. Less variance would be nice, maybe even the same as war.

(I can't remember the exact values off the top of my head, but I think you get the point)

[Markus]

I like all the changes. I will comment on only one however.

I think it should be allowed for ANY monarch to use Bindstones.

I think at the current time Villas and Mansions only serve two purposes (in NPK worlds).

1. They give you in game storage.

2. They give you a meeting spot for your allegiance.

Other then that they are worthless and expensive IMO.

Most housing is closed off to strangers, so its not like you can go around checking out other players decor.

Plus, Houses are SEVERELY limited to how you can decorate them. There's essentialy no uniqueness to housing. All mansions look exactly the same, for example. It would be nice if we had more freedom to 'design' housing in AC. But I think you've already mentioned a long time ago that your current Build just simply couldnt handle all the 'props'.

Anyway, thumbs up Turby!

[Shevali]

Think this opens possiblities for DT. Would give us something else to fight for/protect and increase the PK action if everyone in the monarchy from the smallest to the largest could recall at a moments notice to defend "their" town!

All the topics seem pretty cool.

[Ryori]

Heal issues: It would be nice to just see the variance closed a bit. I know this is likely perception but on Revit and heal it seems I get in the lower 25% of return most of the time. I'd still use a drain or StH more often than not if in combat.

Treasure Seems to be much better this last patch. But in playing around there still seem to be gaps in the middle levels. Those that need the most seem to have the toughest chance of finding it (i.e. a new toon needs everything, a high end toon doesn't need much - a middle toon's skills are great yet, and has more selective needs but good cash and skill items (casters, weapons or armor) seem to have a hole in there.

Debuffs On most of the PvM situations 30 seconds and 2 minutes are the same thing. It doesn't live that long. In a group situation, most things don't live 2 minutes in VoD. While I agree that would nerf solo hunters, the number of things that took me 2 minutes to kill over the years is fairly tiny.

That said, I think it makes more sense to have all debuffs follow the same timing chart.

One post made it seem like melees got the worst of the debuffs. Critters debuff a mage's attack skills - they only debuff a melees support stats. With 6s a mage could loose 52 points.. a melee 23 and a missle 13. I have found that debuffing my melees doesn't do much at all.. missles a little (especially a vuln with mel def debuff) and mages a lot.

[seeker]

One deep concern:

Please do not reduce the effectiveness of creature debuffs on monsters. Two minutes is a very short time.

[po-dunk]

If treated healing kits are going to be added to the loot system then they should be eliminated/reduced as rewards for turning in pincers, vapor golem hearts and yellow virindi jewels. I would much rather get a single platinum scarab instead of all those healing kits. I would lalso like to see prismatic tapers added to the loot system. would really make it "a reason to check every corpse". I realy like the idea of the binding stones. Even though my allegiance tends to congregate at the mansion it would be nice if we had a town we could call ours even if there are other allegiance binding to the same town. If the system (in any form) is implemented it should definately include mansion owning allegiance aswell as villa owning allegiances. If it's just villa owning allegiance with this new recall ability it would further reduce the value of owning a mansion and it's high maintainance cost

[Versace]

Allegiance officers:
Allegiance officers would be initially designated by the monarch, and would have the power to run any existing monarch command: all of the broadcast and message of the day commands, @allegiance info, the ability to designate or remove other officers, and all of the boot, ban, and kick commands. They would not have the ability to change allegiance mansion or villa guest or storage lists. Allegiance officers also will not be able to boot the monarch.

I'm concerned with allowing someone other than the monarch to use the boot command. Especially if officers would be allowed to designate other officers. I'm not exactly comfortable with the monarch having the ability to break my toons that I have sworn to each other either through whim or accident in the first place, but I accept the possibility of it. Putting that ability into the hands of someone I may or may not know just isn't right.

[Kirika]

Player cast critter debuffs are an important part of hunting in VoD and Caul, as well as on some quests. Please don't lower the amount of time that these last.

Lowering the variance on the existing heal & revit rather than just sliding the entire range up would be far more useful. A big part of the attraction of s2h7 over heal self 7 is simply the reliability of it.

[Widsith]

Originally posted by GKusnick
Any chance that the bindstones will be usable by unpledged characters? In other words, is the purpose of bindstones to reward people for joining an allegiance by giving them two more recalls than unpledged characters have? Or is it to encourage people to spend more time in town by giving them an easy way to get there without spending a portal or lifestone recall slot on it? If it's the latter, then giving unpledged characters equal access to this feature seems fair and sensible.

I may be wrong, but isn't a player who is not pledged considered a monarch? It may be an allegiance of one, but it is still a monarch. I did not see anywhere in the follow-up that said there was a lower limit to the number of followers needed to use the bind. Of course, the answer could be on the bind stone specific thread that I have not had a chance to read yet.

[Kachina]

My mage hunts alone most of the time, I need the yield spell, and most often hunt groups of creatures. I will take much longer to kill if this change goes into effect. As is, I frequently do not get to loot many of my kills because of the to short of decay time on monster corpses and instant respawn that occurs in areas I hunt. Ayan and Desert Edge are terrible for this. :mad:
For me a meaningful change would be a functional magic defense.

[Heideggar]

If you're going to allow for moderators/officers in the allegiance, it might be nice to have a command that will list them.

Hell, even add that to the player's screen when they're ID'ed. It'd be kind of like a status symbol, but it shows that those people represent that allegiance (which they should be doing), that they can help people in the allegiance, they're trustworthy, and gives others something to strive for as well.


Just an idea.

[Won-Po_Bubba]

I like the allegiance binding stone idea - it should improve cross-allegiance socialization. Sort of reminds me of 3 years ago or so when my allegiance and Thor's shared Bandit Castle on MT.

I would prefer to leave the negative creature spell timer at 4 mins for Lvl 7. I use war and life magic debuffs on high level monsters and it may take more than 2 minutes for me to kill some - especially caul bosses with crazy high HP.

[ratatosk]

you say level VII debuff spells last 4 min. Then is the description in the spell bar incorrect? it indicates 3 min. for Negative spells that i cast,
yes monster cast neg level 7 spells last for 4 min.
senario is it takes me just over 3 min. to kill a monster. so i use level 6 critter and level 7 life debuffs then at 3+min all i need to do is recast the life debuff.
your proposed 2 min. duration on critter debuffs is well, kinda short sighted.

[Rhysem]

Critter Debuffs

Agreed that critter debuffs of mobs can not be 2 minutes. That's too short to make them worth casting - you make spec critter a worthless school.

Thank you for informing us of this well ahead of time. If you don't reverse your decision I certainly won't look at going from War/Life/MagicD to War/Critter/Magicd.

I think it's the wrong decision, but at least you've told us. A+ job even if you leave it (tho please look at reducing VoD monster magicds if you do, and casting skills because.

Arrow pathing

I don't think that'll really solve the problem. I'm a PvM'er, but I know I can cause mobs to miss by a good 2-character widths with just sliding around. PvP maybe you can't slide so much, but I suspect the above is still applicable. Tripling the width of an arrow won't hit me. Rock, maybe.

Be sure to test rocks with that.

While we're speaking of pathing, can you look into mage (and archer) pathing for fast-moving critters? Put in some logic to /never/ shoot behind you when something is charging you really fast?

There's nothing I hate more than winding up a 7 to blow it out my backside.

... Okay I lied...

There's one thing I hate more than blowing a 7 out my butt. I hate when the server eats spells. Wind up a war 7, along with the two other mages I'm with. Mob is at a sliver of health... it won't live thru a war 7 let alone three. Windup finishes. Nothing happens. No resist message. No hit message. No spell effect at all. Windups start again for everyone and finally kill the mob.

Happens for war/life/critter/item all of em. And it sucks.

[Archer Medes]

Treasure Revisions -
I was hoping for Pyreal pea drops, but I could live with Copper, Silver, and Gold peas if they drop with some increased frequency. Anxious to see what the new potions will be.

Ranged Attacks -
The Speed/Accuracy Slider change means nothing. In PvM, I have it full accuracy all the time, unless I'm clearing out a nest of low level creatures in a quest. I tried PKL against a mage. I hit him for a whopping 17 points with a buffed AR bow. Hitting wasn't a big problem, damage was. War spells killed me in 2 shots.
Making the projectile twice the size won't do much unless it was like going from a 22 cal. to a 45 cal. (more mass and kinetic energy). I imagine that increasing the diameter will cause more interactions with the environment. How does an arrow compare in diameter to a war spell? I know the point was about dodging missiles, but until archers have a chance in PvP, I won't be doing PK. (Topic dropped)

Negative Spell timers -
For the main character I play (archer), I am in favor of the 2 min debuffs. I spent 139 mil xp in Magic Def vs 167 mil xp in Melee Def, and I feel that Magic Def. is just about worthless. When I hunt in areas for my level, I hardly ever resist the creatures. I am always debuffed. The only hope is to gem, continue to attack debuffed, run, or hope for the debuffs to drop. With a 2 min limit, the last option will occur more frequently. I agree with the mage arguments above, but like I said, for my character, I like the 2 min. limit. I'm sure I would like an effective Magic Def even better. ;)

Meetings near towns -
I would guess that our allegiance would still meet at the mansion. Many times we drop things for others to pick up if they could use them. Its a wild guess, but I don't think that would work too well near town. Also, we would all have to talk in allegiance chat, since we would be spamming everyone nearby. Even if we met in the hall, there would still be lurkers. There has to be better ways to bring life back to the town. (ie. Items of value, ease of transportation to other areas, Dereth quest listings, sporting events)

[Zero_Washu]

LOOT CHANGES

Are you going to increase the number of items per drop?

Adding things is OK, however, you can end up "nerfing" loot by simply flooding it with too many junk items. Just like the new armor you will introduce this month means less of the other armor types.

PROJECTILE

Change to accuracy slider, big whoopee. Sorry but PK changes don't mean squat to PvE. It looks like both changes are primaryly aimed at PK. Perhaps you should fix the complaints archers have had since day one? Like hitting the ground a lot of the time when targets charge. Have arrows go backwards? Having misfires in doorways that have no door? Like having mobs get pushed sideways by an arrow? The number one reason archers miss isn't the target dodging but instead its the client screwing up.

Seems most of those affect mages as well. I think your engine needs fixed. Making shots bigger probably will mean we get more inteference from the landscape. This will be very noticable on the Vesayens and other dense areas of the game.

[Rhysem]

Originally posted by Kachina
My mage hunts alone most of the time, I need the yield spell, and most often hunt groups of creatures. I will take much longer to kill if this change goes into effect. As is, I frequently do not get to loot many of my kills because of the to short of decay time on monster corpses and instant respawn that occurs in areas I hunt. Ayan and Desert Edge are terrible for this. :mad:
For me a meaningful change would be a functional magic defense.

MagicD works great AFTER a WMI LMI and CMI on the critter. Even in DV, that's where I hunt. Virindi. Ya know, the big mobs.

Add in a feeble and baffle and it's finally functional.

Of course, without spec critter it'll take you 2 minutes to get up all those, at which point you'll need to start refreshing them...

And my specc'd D works great in the general dires. I've never heard that many sporks before.

Dunno about the west shore, tell ya next patch after I go abuse cabs and peerless.

[Heideggar]

lol, absolute worst thing was:

yielded a Tulimat Hollow Minion, burned a plat.
shot a war at it, it jiggled, I missed, burned a plat.
Shot another war, but just as I let go, it ran to me, shooting me in the face. I looked down to see if I took face damage from my own war, nope, but I burned a plat.

Now I'm sitting there, wondering why I just burned 3 g'damn plats!

hehe, then heard my guy go "HOLY **** OOOOFFF", so I healed, and didn't burn a plat : ) but used up 50 mana for 85 hp. Which is one hit from a tulimat's crit.

I pull out my wand of death curteous of Bael'zharon and kill the minion, and ever since, have not burnt a plat. Maybe this staff has magic beyond my comprehension....





^mostly fiction

however, I _do_ shoot myself in the face on 50% of the stuff I fight when using bolts, and arcs hit stuff running if they're within 15-20 feet of you (short distance).

My BZ staff has no properties (biting nuts, critical blowing, etc.).

I'm not saying I want one either. Just that it's the one staff to rule them all : )

[Ivanhoe]

Archery changes sound good to start with. Im hoping IF/WHEN you find out 2x the area of impact isnt enough that it will be increased again. (If 2x is enough then great but i have high doubts)

HOPEFULLY it is enough of a change to impact pvp where ZC from 1 inch away from target isnt able to dodge arrows.

As with the -40 instead of -50 I hope this solves the issues of a Untrained missle d person Still being able to evade arrows with only buffed untrained missle d skill.

Imo untrained missle d on a person should allow all missle attacks to hit the target unless they are half a radar or more away from the ranged attacker.

[KPD157]

I don't know if it has been mentioned in the topic but I wonder if it would be possible to make the Greater and the Deadly heads have a greater width so they can have a greater chance of not being dodged by movement :)

Also on the same idea I would love to see the same effect for higher level spells as well if they don't already have some effect in place so that a level 1 will be easier to dodge than a level VII :)

[otto mo beale]

RE Allegiance bindstones. I LIKE IT!

Can be effective but you should add things to make them more effective. To make towns more effective you need a multi pronged approach.

1) Make a safe place for allegiance bots (like the tent in AB)
1a) Perhaps guardian statues in town to cast low level harms at critters or better yet very high level "scare away" spells.
2) Make a statue that casts say 10 point buff to tinkers, cooking, fletching, and alch. (duration 1 minute or something lowish but not crazy low)
3) MAKE THE NEWB TOWNS MORE ATTRACTIVE TO SELL IN!. raise cap to 50k max so I can sell there. Im willing to sell in shoushi at 90% (perhaps meeting some newbs when the x pack comes live) but you have to make it so I can do it and wont be penalized for it. 40k haubies are common. I can deal with the rare 50K+ item.
4) Can you make town centers portal storm proof?
5) Put a couple attractive (click on sos newbs dont accidentally portal themselves to hell) portals in each town center.
6) Other ideas Im sure others have come up with.....


To make towns more attractive these ideas need to be combined into a comprehensive set of changes not a single change. Make it so a bot can be safe etc....

[Heideggar]

Rhysem, I've got an all-trained mage and even he resists virindi some : )

Now, if we had the OLD magic D system, lol, that was a joke : )

Just saying that with around 390-395 skills, you can debuff virindi quite a bit without a ton of time. Magic D doesn't have to be phenominal either. 260+ base magic D, throw in any cantrips with that, and you'll see a very nice amount of resists on a lot of the content. Sadly, there are just certain things that you won't be resisting much unless you debuff your oponent. If resisting means life or death, debuffing is the way to go though.


Archer Medes, that was an exampled with a loot level 5 (80+). There is a loot level 6, and *scratch head* loot level 7?. Most definetly up to 6 though. So, you may see your pyreal peas, but just not in the 80+ area. Most likely on VoD stuff, sing trvoes, mahogany chests, etc.

Peas help make the hunting continue with the limited pack space I have.

I have ~ 60 free spaces to hold stuff on my mages. He only carries enough DI's for one death, health kits, wands, any elixers, splitting tool, ust, comps, etc. etc. oh yeah, the space is limited : )


In PvP, the big issue with archers is they miss all sorts of stuff. I PvP with mages mostly, and from time to time with my PvM oriented (non magic heavy) bow/ua/melee guy. It was never a matter of me not doing good damage when I hit, it was the number of times I would hit hehe. I can't remember exactly the size of war magic... I think it's like the size of your upper torso. It's rather big imo, and it should be. resources used... It shuold have a big area. I don't think you guys will find it that bad with the increased size of the projectiles when trying to squeeze arrows between trees and such. Moving a little bit (emphasis on a little bit) shouldn't be too big of a problem if the number of unsuccessful shots is decreased enough.


I'm not sure what you fight Medes, but some things just naturally get through magic D unless it's really high. 139 million xp and 167 million xp is probably a lot, but I've spent over a billion into magic D alone, then 1.5 billion into focus and self, roughly. Thing is, for what I fight, VoD and other high end areas, I don't resist much either : ) When I go a couple hunting levels lower, nothing can touch me magic wise : )

The thing with magic D, is that it's free. If it actually would cost skill credits to even train, I'm sure it'd be much more usefull. Maybe even as usefull as missle D.... wait, people pay for missle D.... : ) For something that's free, and not that bad really... magic D is pretty good. Missle D... oh boy... majorly not working hehe.

[UA Klutz]

Maybe I am too much of a mercenary but I think the bindstone and the changes to the vendors loot profiles are working at cross purposes. Why hang out in a low level town that your monarchy is bindstoned to when you can hang out in a higher level town and get better stuff from the vendors. Perhaps a better solution would be to create NPC players in the towns that can provide unique services. Make different services available in different towns and maybe folks will visit the towns to get something they can't get elsewhere.

I can chat with my friends from anywhere in Dereth so I don'tneed to go to a town to socialize and I can self buff (slowly and with many fizzles) so I don't really need to go to a town to get the benifits of my clans buffbot. Make the towns provide something unique than can't be duplicated by regular players

[Ibn]

Originally posted by Heideggar
"Distribution of mundane items – see Treasure Revisions above – will be based on the level of the town’s surrounding content. The greater the level of the town’s surrounding content, the better the items that the vendors will sell."

Most of the stuff I buy from vendors I buy in mediocre towns. Will I need to buy my slash, pierce, and bludge arrowheads in high priced towns then?

Will this be exclusive to your new items? Just trying to get a feel of what could potentially be a huge money sink for people.

Arrowheads won't be changing, just the types of items specifically mentioned. No, this will not be exclusive to the items that will be new in May.

[zathros]

I like the stamina and health spell changes. The demand was for zero and we got some, so we're already ahead of the game. :)

Also, since treated kits are going to be in the loot profile, could you replace quest rewards of treated kits with prismatic taper peas? They wouldn't be common enough to be unbalancing, but they would add a new tradable to the game.

[Ibn]

Originally posted by Widsith
I may be wrong, but isn't a player who is not pledged considered a monarch? It may be an allegiance of one, but it is still a monarch. I did not see anywhere in the follow-up that said there was a lower limit to the number of followers needed to use the bind. Of course, the answer could be on the bind stone specific thread that I have not had a chance to read yet.

No, you need to have at least 1 follower to be a monarch.

[Sake]

Sigh... It's not their duration that make creature debuffs such a pain, if that's all it was I'd just cast a dispel or burn a gem to get rid of them, (which will be quite easier with the upcoming changes) it’s the fact that the same ones get casted on you again and again and again and again... What's the point of wasting time for the spell to disappear or clorizite to dispel it when you'll just have the same debuffs thrown on you next fight.

New types of potions sound like they'll just cause more pk balance problems then they're worth...

The allegiance changes seem nice though...

Changing vender items to match a town's level range? Does that mean, that after four bloody years, mage venders in some towns will finally sell higher level scarabs than silver? That alone could increase traffic to a lot of towns. Though to be honest, changing the starter town venders (the towns you'd most want to have large numbers of people in) to match their level ranges, instead of adding things to attract higher level people to them as well, would more than likely just insure that they continue to stay empty and abandoned.

[Flipo]

Allegiance account boot: Excellent.

Allegiance account ban: On the Mark!
How do I un-ban them?

Allegiance chat kick: Excellent start!

Allegiance officers: Oh boy! Scary and nice at same time. This one will cause some monarchs sleepless nights on how to best use or not use. Trust factor will have to be very high on anyone given an officer positition. They will have to know how dangerous a boot can be to clan. Nice thing would be a known griefer sneaks into clan ( who is not on account ban ) and an officer can fix it immediately. This deserves a woot!

Allegiance house storage: Nice option.

I would like "@allegiance info" timer be reduced or removed in order to walk the monarchy tree. Seems obvious to me that AC should provide this information to monarchs rather then a 3rd party web site or plugin. Course the ultimate would be a tab titled Monarch ( maybe put along side Map,House ) and allow us to mouse thru clan. :)

[-Six-]

Instead of making bindstones new objects, just enable monarchs to do a special monarchy tie to any lifestone. (The ability to do this tie could come from a quest item or a quest scroll.)

Doing it this way would be easier because there would be no need to create and deploy bindstones. Plus using lifestones would give more options for ties and prove to be more robust.

[Heideggar]

Thanks ibn, but I'm still a bit fuzzy on it. In the letter, the only example that I could find was related to a specific portion the item system in only one loot profile, that being lvl 5.

Spell Components
Mana Stones
Potions
Lockpicks
Healing Kits


Now, some of these will have new unique items found in the creature loot profile (unlike an NPC who sells loot) only.

I imagine that the non-new items, mostly, will be upgraded and allowed to be sold in varrying difficulty towns, depending on their surroundings. !? Is that safe to say?

I'm just curious, will an upgrade to town mages, and other vendors, take away the value of master mages, crafting potions, or completing small quests (pincers, mnemosynes, yellow jewels, etc) !?

I mean, there really isn't much of a point of turning in mnemosynes (running all the way to tufa) for kits that I can buy at the store. I don't need to visit Celdiseth, Shoyanen, "the other guy", the undead mage, or the chick in Martine's holding, if I can buy all the supplies in a more convenient location. I suppose the prices will drive people to them, as most things do.

Perhaps you could shed a little light on this aspect, and how it will have an effect on teh current situation of the game?

[Jet-eye-nite]

1. alleg improvements are good for larger groups ,but if a mistake is made and realized say in an hour or less maybe the booted person could be re-enstated .
2. I hope you do bring towns back to life
3. Maybe the archer +'s should be the other direction -50 to +60
were all not pvp players here
4. I also hope for extended testing on the size of the hit area for an archer . Maybe it could be used with #3 above and adjust with the slider so if you want speed you suffer smaller window but if you choose acc then you benifit from a wider window .
5. Update to towns in the form of better selling loot is good
6.blah blah blah loot update is or could be great,I would hope you look at this far enough to include plat peas
7.I have never been able to get even a cottage so I can't respond to the bindstone other than I hope its not a one time tie and can be changeable .
8.Maybe neg spells can only be landed once while the same spell in in force ,not saying mobs couldn't hit you with another spell.
ex if you currently have sensense any other mob would have to cast a different spell as while in affect it would not land . Maybe some other deadly spell like cooking inept (j/k,lol) .Infact maybe the spells casted could run through a random spell gen that actually might get you cooking inept .

As it is now it is the same 5 or 6 spells everytime .

Fot the most part I sum your ideas up as follows



:D ,:cool: ,;) ,:)

[shobo-dt]

Missle weapon Fix:

I don't think this will be enough. I can't count the number of times I have someone 1-2 arrows from death and they do a quick circle around behind you, jiggle a bit, and they're off to chug and heal. War is easier to dodge but hits for 2-3 times the damage as missle, so the missle weapons should work somewhat more reliably at range than war does. In addition, I take a good 3-4 melee weapon shots from an oponent simply to arm and raise my weapon while a mage has his wand out and is always ready to fire/heal. Hitting sword guys for 40-60 while they blast you for 160 is futile.

[Eruditus]

Originally posted by Ibn
It's to cut down on the annoyance when a creature casts a creature debuff on you. If you don't have any dispels, your combat ability may be crippled for the full length of the debuff. This is unlike a vuln or brittlemail where you still have your combat ability, but are being hit for more damage.

A fair rationale yet you completely ignore the simple fact that you have added creatured to the game which debuff weapons therefore cripple a melee's combat ability.

Couple this with Orion stating this ability would eventually find its way throughout dearth and this makes the changes VERY unbalancing.

If critter spells are 2 mins so should item spells.

[sylphia]

OK here you go Ibn :)

Allegiance:
Please tell me you plan on RESTRICTING the ability to boot or ban an entire account to ONLY the monarch/officers. Too much potential for mayhem if ANY clan member can boot/ban someone under them, and at the same time remove all their other toons throughout the clan. If the follower wants someone removed thatbadly, they need to consult the monarch/officer and let THEM make that decisions.

The player doing an account ban/boot SHOULD see all the names of the toons being tossed. This has too much potential to bork rank trees, because the person doing the booting didnt know the other toons on that account were integral to the tree. Again, if this is restricted to the monarch/officers, privacy really shouldnt be an issue here. If you want to maintain privacy by hiding the names, then we need better and FASTER tools in place for th emonarch to actively "scan" his tree to see who is where. The /allegicane info is too slow and cumbersome. Ideally, an interface that comes up in the allegiance panel, which allows the monarch to chase up or down the tree...click on a vassal's name, and click "show ties", and it shows that player's patron and all vassals. It would require the monarch to "work his way down" but it would be better than the current system.

Bindstones = good; all I will say here baout it since it has its own thread :)

Loot:
The example looks good. FINALLY peas are getting improved...now make them drop a bit more often :)

Ranged Attacks:
Make the left side 0% and the right side +50% Since archers dont get a HS bonus, all this bar is currently doing is "faking" an HS; there is no direct increase to damage for the increased wait time, like there is on spells and melee attacks. If you are going to do this do it right; a 10% change will be piddling.

I am all for arrows being harder to dodge. How about some "explosive" type arrows too, that act similar to a ring spell on impact?

Spells:
Timers: Proposal sounds good, though if you are going to make critter debuffs lock in at 2 mins, why not just do it all the way around, and remove any confusion. Keep it Simple :)

Heals/Revites: I like :) I would also like to see a reduction in the speed of OTHER healing spells; it would make the "support" mage's job better. Increased bang for th ebuck and better over-time rating on the speed of heals can mean the difference between saving someones life, or watching them die to a chain-casting mob.

You DO realize that by upping the SPELL heals, you are going to have the KIT healers wanting some love, right? :)

Towns:
Looks good to me.

[Spec_LC]

Ibn,


Will there be a limit to the amount of accounts you can ban from entering your alleginace just like there is a limit on the amount of people you can squelch?

[Bardolan]

I have a qualm about the creture enchantment debuffs being dropped to 2:00 for all levels...

I am a creature spec mage and as such tend to be the "debuffer" for boss creatures... I know that if I have to fully rip into a creature (ie, gaerlan to help a lower level get the kill) It takes me about 2:00 to debuff him.... wich means I will be constantly doing nothing but debuffs in many situations where I could be nearly equally usefull as a healer...

It will also limit my abilities to effectivly hunt in a solo situation be it a small spawn in VOD or anywhere else where I might want to limit a creatures ability to harm me.

I am sorry but I based my template aroound debuffs and resistance, and by killing debuff times farther you will make 8 skill credits and a billion xp partially useless.

[romside]

Allegiances:

Would it be possible to build in an list command (maybe officer and monarch only), which lists all people in the chat? Or would that be too much lag when executed?

Mundane Items:
Missing Pyreal peas as highend loot. And whats about changing all quest Npc's, who are giving treated kits to plentiful kits?


Romside

[Aztek]

The archery changes dont look like they will be nearly enough.

Perhaps the changes you outlined and speed up the arrows a bit as well.

Either that or forget all that and just increase damage on the weeping bow as archery against monsters seems fine to me as it is.

[Blau]

Allegiance binding: Great idea, but just let us bind to any LifeStone. Don't try to force our hand into playing the way you want us to. Reviving towns is good, but don't be so draconian that you chase us all off. If you adopt the "build it and they will come" mentality, it will be a success. If you adopt the "put them in prison" mentality, it will fail.

Ranged Weapons: The slider thing sounds fine but I'm not sure why you're doing it. I hope it's not for PvP because that won't really make a difference. Doubling the width of the ranged ammunition from the size of a pea to the size of a grape just doesn't seem to me like it will make much difference. I think if this is the solution, you'll really have to change it from the size of a pea to the size of a Tomahawk cruise missile - and even then I'm not so sure.

[Phosphine]

Spell Durations
I like the spell timers the way they are, especially the critter spells. Change the critter debuffs to 2 minutes will only cause more spell casting and more component burn and mages will feel it the most of all. This will be very telling at the higher levels. I think this is very ill-advised. At least wait til the dispels are in use for awhile. And lower the plat burn rate if you do go through with this.

healing spells
I don't see the need for these changes.

treasure tables
I think the casino rewards changes is very minor, used by few, and will be soon forgotten, unless a glaring error is made. In which case, the casinos will be thronged with wild eyed characters throwing thier savings down in vain hope of striking it rich. Next!

The loot being collected -- other than level 7 scrolls -- is REALLY POOR. Even for level 90+ characters fighting level 125+ mobs, ITS REALLY POOR. Mages are finding it hard to pay the bills.

[War-Wizard-HG]

FIX THE BLOODY @#$($@$^%#(*&#@$ WAR TRACKING

[Tyrion]

Changes look great Turbine ;)

And I know this won't happen, but what'd be even better is moving allegiance mansions actually into towns (or just ouside of them). This would promote PK wars and the usage of towns rather than random spots on the landscape :)

Again difficult, but maybe even consider moving housing (cottages, villas), closer to towns too, so they're more like villages than towns I guess.


What's the problem with war tracking? Elaborate if you want a chance at a decent response, twit.

[Virindi Clown]

Houses cause too much lag to be in or near a town at all.

Projectiles of ANY kind have huge tracking issues. Bolts shoot in weird directions or behind you any time something charges at you quickly or jerks in one direction. Arrows are extremely difficult to land on any type of moving target, including a person just wiggling back and forth. That is very irritating in PvM, as well as PvP, but nerfs archers in PvP.

Everything was good, but why such subtle changes in some of that stuff?

Just 7 or so points on the average better for healing spells? I think they should go up a solid 20. They are pretty slow and expensive, and you did nerf low level stamina to health spells.

What is the deal with the 60% skill instead of 50% on full speed? I always thought 75% might not be enough, because reasonably, a maxed out archer should be able to hit atleast level 80+ monsters on full speed good. 75% would not kill missile defense in PvP. It's completely overpowered, so it needs a drastic change. Bow does LESS damage than sword, so it has to be balanced around full speed attacks.

Also, what about the speed that arrows travel at? They take too darned long to reach their target. That's an issue in PvP. They should move like streaks, atleast when they point straight. If you shoot an arrow out of one of those big bows it doesn't come at you like a rock someone tossed up in the air, and that's what it looks like in AC.

You need to beef up ALL healing kits, not just the little ones. Most importantly, the better ones should be more effective BELOW HALF HEALTH. When you are hurt and you need them, they become useless, and instead items that require no skill like elixirs are better!

I hope you don't make elixirs better. They really need a nerf, and healing needs a huge boost to make it worth the credits.

[Fzzt]

My thoughts on allegiance officers/commands:

I worry about abuse with the new allegiance commands, before you had to drill down from a known point to find a persons other characters now when you boot, ALL their characters are booted however does that mean it also breaks their patrons/vassals and if so what happens to those that were trapped between their characters?

Speaking of which what I think should be done is this:

Monarch can issue ALL commands and lord his might over the kingdom; however allegiance officers should be required to have BOTH officers online and issuing the SAME commands within a reasonable amount of time to institute a kick and ban or some sort of consensus vote so that if one officer was hacked they could not tear an allegiance apart.

Fzzt of FF.

[Asbestos]

A 7.5% increase in my ability to heal? Oh man, compared to the nerfs the "loving" sucks. How about you make Heal Self 7 do 100-150 health and then we'll have something to talk about.

[bkatz2]

I don't understand why you are going to INCREASE the amount of dispell options, then DECREASE the effects of creature debuffs. It seems that you're unbalancing an already unbalanced game and creating the following problems:

1) Creature is further nerfed, and pointless to spec (especially for pvp)
2) Monster difficulty is reduced because everyone has buffs and gems, and no one (mobs vs players or players vs other players) have any way to neutralize very high buffed stats or skills on other players. This means that a low level player cannot compete under any circumstances with a high level player EXCEPT with large numbers.
3) The game in general will offer less challenge.

Here's a good example of why this will suck for everyone (including you): level 120 mage vs level 230 mage w/ spec resist. Level 120 mage first has almost no chance landing a yield without spec creature (but what reason does he have to spec creature other than yielding high level players? he can't afford to spec it because he also has to land a vuln and land wars), but furthermore he now has to land one every 2 minutes. Oh whoops level 120 can't really level up AS effectively anymore because of illegal UCM, so he'll either a) move to another server or b) quit (i'm sure some people can tollerate it and have the time to watch their macros, but i wouldn't say this is a majority). I know i wouldn't stick around in a situation where i knew i didn't have a chance to win or improve to the point of being able to win.

Another example, what about when you're chasing another player on Darktide. You debuff their STR and run, but this will do you much less good with 2 minute debuff timers.

Creature debuffs, while annoying, are not a very big deal - especially on an npk server where players can hoard gems (which will now be stackable!!??) that they won't even need because dispells will be castable. Personally I was in the process of making a spec creature melee character on Darktide but after seeing this, it would be pointless. In my opinion - with all of the new dispell options - creature debuff timers should BE RAISED.

Going through with this reduction in creature magic effectiveness will make yet another school of magic pointless to spec (the other being item). This post is mainly pointing towards the pvp fallout. Darktide will be a gemfest next month, and nerfing creature is not the answer to anything.

---- end of creature argument, this below is misc random stuff i'd like to argue for/about.---***************************

I suggest you either a) give schools of magic some further perk to spec (i.e. special spells that only specced magics can use) or the realistic option b) don't nerf debuffs ESPECIALLY if you're going to increase the amount of dispell options. I think the buff changes are good (less time to buff), but i don't think adding dispell options, or nerfing debuffs is time well spent. I think it would be better for Asheron's Call in general and in the long run if you spent those resources adding content (like those rares you proposed awhile back, for example).

Also, DT can't really get any new players without allowing UCM, which hurts the number of people on the server, which makes people switch to other games. UCM on DT does not hurt other players by griefing/taking up spawns, and can be policed/raided by other DTers. I think this is a bad idea to ban people on DT for trying to compete with the rest of the server. Had this decision been implemented and enforced 3 years ago, i'd sing a different tune. For years i've thought a new pvp server with a level 70 cap would have been perfect.

Oh yeah and dropping mansion barriers will help the level of enjoyment tremendously on DT (i.e. people can actually raid again instead of recalling around looking for fights).

Sorry for this VERY long response, but these are the bulk of my thoughts regarding this letter and the game in general.

[Viamund]

I think that if I cast a lvl VII vuln it should last for at least 7 mins and not 4 - if I am fighting a lvl 166 odd creature and I land vulns - well that creature could have 10k HP and 4 mins just doesn't cut it. I do a great deal of SOLO hunting and I think you had best reconsider a lvl VII vuln lasting only 4 mins.

[ArtilexOfDarkti]

I do not think spell durations should be changed, in the time it would take to debuff most creat spells, they would have to be re casted. They would become almost useless, they intent of using them is to weaker your oponent, or the other monsters long enough for you to take some action, but if you are struggling to hit the monster... you cast magic yield... then maybe bafflement, feeblemind, then onto imps/vulns. By then... the yield is gone and it was a complete waste, and some monsters require more than 2 minutes to kill, which would become even more annyoing and destroy the ability of solo game playing.

-Artilex

[Jape]

About healing spell changes:

7.5 points more health with lv VII spell. That seems bit low (but it is change to right direction).. Currently healing spells are slow to cast and they arent that effective.

Anyway. I was wondering if its possible to allow heal self spells to crit.

Critical hit, you heal yourself for 210 hit points!

Would make critical strike wands bit more uselful :)

[LugianWarlord]

Originally posted by Ibn
It's to cut down on the annoyance when a creature casts a creature debuff on you. If you don't have any dispels, your combat ability may be crippled for the full length of the debuff. This is unlike a vuln or brittlemail where you still have your combat ability, but are being hit for more damage.

It's not THAT much of an annoyance, except to mages whom often get the Life/War inept spell - don't recall the last time my sword character got a Sword inept cast on him by a monster...

And every mage I know has their dispel life and dispel critter self 6 spells... (and if they don't? Too bad, there are plenty of SIKs in the game, and they're otherwise cheap and useless now that WAY too many monsters drop level 7's)

Even then, dispel gems are so easy to get and use (stackable soon?) that there's no excuse to not carry them and use them (I've got at least 27 eviscerator pincers and about 40 large unlocked mnemosynes on my characters = 215 more dispel gems I can get at any time.)

Reducing the timers is really only going to hurt players who use them offensively and in group hunts, ie. in VoD, Caul, Bobo Quest, Queen's Quest, etc...

[rooskie]

Pyreal (and even Gold) Scarabs in the loot are very, very helpful. Removing them from the mix would mean many more trips to the Master Mage for those of us that don't cast VII's.

[Taarna]

I think the Bindstone option would be very handy even for allegiances with a mansion or villa. Any new options we can have for travel are good.

The rest of the ideas are good too. I like the fact that the mundane items are getting an update, they have been mostly useless in their current state.

[SCM]

The allegiance boot/ban is an excellent idea, & will be a welcome addition in the fight to keep thieves & undesirables out of the respectable clans.

The Officers needs a bit more thought regarding the power to boot/change another.
What can be done if officer 1, elected by the monarch, whom I assume is the other officer, your explanation is not clear on this, takes a dislike to the monarch & removes him/her from the officer position & replaces him/her with a friend?
Does the monarch have the power to override this situation?

All in all the changes look good on paper.

[elowan]

my take on the downside to allege tools....

I like the chat boot.....long over due......

however....downside to giving peope the powers of booting and banning people if they are NOT the monarch......

you cannot boot the monarch......you CAN however boot all directs below them....making them alone without followers......the officer could give his power to someone in clan that has problems with the monarchy and wants power for themselves.....insta take over.

think about it...would ya like the fate of your alleg membership in the hands of a level 1 mule thats angry at not being PLed?
I know I would not.

just my two pyreals worth.

[Celestin]

My main feeling on all of this is that while allegiance officers are a great idea, I feel that it would be an even better idea if it were possible to 'lock' and 'unlock' allegiance commands so that the monarch could prevent officers from using, for instance, the boot command, if they so desired. This would allow each monarch to customize the abilities of their officers.

On another note, it would be really nice if you could somehow tie the number of allegiance officers available to the rank of the monarch. Perhaps the maximum number of officers could be the rank minus three, giving rank 4 monarchies the ability to appoint a single officer, but massive rank 9 monarchies the ability to appoint up to 6 officers.

[Nova_Cat_HG]

With the planed debuff changes, i belive you killed the last of the Og mages. (including my main cha)

Imo, the higher the level spell, the longer the debuff should last.

"negative Creature spells last exactly 2 minutes, regardless of level" I think that is plain silly.

[Strick]

The debuff spell timers need to be re-thought IMO.

I like that fact that if I get a level VII vuln, or creature debuff I know that it will wear off before the level VI vuln or debuff that I may already have on me.

I also mostly cast level VI vulns and debuffs on monsters, cause in the main I like that the level VI spells last a bit longer.

Other than those things, I like the proposed in development changes that are being discussed.

[Jape]

People seem to exaggerate effect of debuff changes.

Normal critters=yield+vuln+war (maybe 2x war)

VoD ctitters= group and there is no issue. they drop lot faster than your debuff drops.

If you solo VoD, just debuff the mob again after 2min has expired. Takes less than 10sec to do it.

This change does not kill Og mages as some peeps here like to say. I see it to have no effect at all.

Side note: soloing VoD is quite stupid anyways. You can get lot better xp and lot better loot from obsidian plains that VoD solo, does not matter how long your debuffs last.

[Yinchi]

Town binding. Don't limit these to clans who only own houses or villa's. This would be an important step in organizing hunts/quests involving several clans. This would be a slap in the face to not allow mansion owners this access since we pay more than anyone else.

Our monarchy has three "sister" monarchies, this would allow us all to easily meet for quests.

[Gesica]

A two minute cap on creature debuffs would limit solo adventuring tremendously, especially when you're combating critters that have high health. Rarely do I hunt VoD in groups, and rarely do I do quests with groups. It's just a preference, and a play style that I have grown acustomed to.

Creature debuffs are fine the way they are. Make dispell spells more accessible rather than having them only in Steel Chests and on monster drop loot. I still have a hard time finding those spells no matter how many SIKS I use, or how many critters I kill. Also rethink the dispell nerfs. It all just seems like a negative chain reaction. If the dispells are left the way they are, and made more easily available there would be no need for the 2 minute creature debuff cap.

PLEASE rethink this. I enjoy soloing tough monsters. I don't plan on changing my play style, so I would be completely 'screwed' and many others as well if you go through with the 2 minute cap.

[Martus]

I am all for the allegiance changes.

Regarding the negative spell timers, yes, lvl7 should be the longest though I would not cut them all down to half than before. I know iI cut into my own flesh as mainly a melee and rarely using any sort of getting rid of negative buffs, longer debuff times will be tougher for me but also makes it more challenging. ;)

So my suggestion, let the lvl 7 run for 8 minutes and the lower ones at an apropriate shorter time.

[Gesica]

If you solo VoD, just debuff the mob again after 2min has expired. Takes less than 10sec to do it.

It's a little tough to have to keep debuffing if you're either a lower level og mage that doesnt have as high of a skill yet, or if you're a trained critter mage.

This change does not kill Og mages as some peeps here like to say. I see it to have no effect at all.

If there's an action, there's always a reaction/effect.

Side note: soloing VoD is quite stupid anyways. You can get lot better xp and lot better loot from obsidian plains that VoD solo, does not matter how long your debuffs last.

Some people enjoy VoD because of the challenge. Obsidian Plains... I can go out there and vuln+war, sometimes two wars and the critter is dead. Or I'll go out with a rend, and use ring spells and half the spawn is dead. That's NOT a challenge, and isn't fun.

So some people choose to hunt in VoD solo. Don't dismiss everyone elses opinion just because you think soloing VoD is stupid.

[knopp]

Originally posted by Kachina
Does the character creation screen supposed to have any value at all? Xbow is 6 to train, and spec, the and 8 for bow. These skills are already grossly overpowered if the creation values are supposed to mean anything. Xbow is so overpowered many of the bow characters dropped bow and spec-ed xbow in my clan. If the character creation screen is meaning less, then no longer nerf mages who have to spend 28 to spec war. Maybe you should use the Dungeon Siege character creation, where every one starts the same, and skill builds with weapon of choice use.
I currently play a:

lvl 58 archer
43 UA
111 sword
84 war mage

I have been playing for over 3 years, and to see archery get so far out of balance is very disturbing. Now you are making it even further out of balance. Not good.


That was my point exactly. You CANNOT change the effectiveness of these attacks without adjusting the credit balance.

For those of you that dont agree, please understand that you are most likely disagreeing because you are an archer.

And for the guy that spoke earlier about me only wanting mages to get any advancement. I ONLY WANT A CREDIT/DAMAGE RATIO THAT IS TOO FAR OUT OF WHACK READJUSTED! I dont care what template you are, but if you spend 12 credits on xbow, it should do LESS than the 16 credit bow, and MUCH LESS than 28 credit war.

I am sick of seeing the sacrifice of credits be overrun by the nerfs due to people coming here and whining. If it is less effective, it cost less credits. Remember Dagger guys? That was Turbines word on nerfing it into utter uselessness after the UA guys cried rivers about the credit balance. SWORD IS NEXT, FOLLOWED BY BOW.

Follow your trend Turbine and balance these things as you have before.

Fix the game on your own time Turbine. The players pay to PLAY AC, not watch you TRY and FAIL to fix it over and over. When you get everyting together, then fix it, until then, please spare the populace the BETA TESTING ENVIRONMENT.




Thanks

[Spike Lady]

I like the new heal/revit spell enhancements. It's not a huge difference and will benefit all equally.

Treasure changes: good stuff.

Missile weapon attack bar: This is NOT going to make any difference whatsoever. If the object is 2 times the size of a bean sprout, what difference will it make?
The accuracy bar being adjusted to -40 to +50 is in effect no change whatsoever.
Do the math: an archer on fastest attack with a bow skill of 500 (buffed) will still have an effective skill of 300. I can get that with just trained missile d. The difference between 250 and 300 is pretty small. Maybe 3-5 levels of exp worth.

The real problem is that the pathing of the object is based on the 'leading' the target formula. So, if I'm just 5 yards from you, and you twitch back and forth, (zxc keys), then the arrow will STILL shoot off at a 45 degree angle based on ones speed at movment. Since ALL pvp/pkl people have a fairly high rate of movement, this will be ZERO improvement for archers in pvp. In PvM, it will be of little difference and in fact, McQue said it best. At an effective level of 170, with a bow skill in the mid 400s, I still have to use full accuracy to hit things that are effectively 1/2 my level.

Other than that, I think your changes are good. BUT PLEASE make it so missile weapons do what is intended and not make insignificant changes.

BTW: to Knoop. (no) War does more massive damage per hit and is harder to avoid at close range then archers. So your numbers are way off.
If a mage hits me 2 in 10 for 200 pts each, that's 400 pts. If I hit you 1 in 10 for 50, that's a huge difference (50:400 or 1:8) so war does 8 times the damge of bow in PvP.

[Jape]

It's a little tough to have to keep debuffing if you're either a lower level og mage that doesnt have as high of a skill yet, or if you're a trained critter mage.

If yore low level Og, go someplace else. VoD is meant for high levels.

Some people enjoy VoD because of the challenge.

OK, devs just added little bit more challenge for you, you should thank them, not whine that they killed Og's :p

But as i said, VoD is meant for high level toons, so if you cant reliably land spells there, go someplace else. If it takes couple minutes to debuff the critter, place quite obviously is not for you yet.

Don't dismiss everyone elses opinion just because you think soloing VoD is stupid.

I havent dismissed anything, i simply told my opinion about the subject.

[Orion]

There seems to be some confusion over the In Development section that focuses on the upcoming missile weapon changes. I want to clarify some of the information there in an effort to quell the speculation.

Accuracy Bar

The changes to the Missile slider bar are being done for player versus player play. This change is being made to minimize impact on PvM play while offering an increased usability of missile skills in PvP.

We are not increasing the max skill that aiming a bow, crossbow, atlatl or thrown weapons will offer. We are reducing the penatly for firing quick shots.

The thought process behind this change is fairly simple. Missile weapons fire slowly at higher accuracy. In the time that it takes a player to fire the projectile from their missile launcher it is very easy for an attentive player to slide away from the point that the projectile is targetted. In PvP players are very conscious about their surrounding and can easily dodge missile users.

As a result, missile users are forced to fire faster in an attempt to strike their targets. The problem now becomes one of skill vs. skill.

Example: Chuck Rock, the crossbow master of Lin meets Internal Flame the Mage on a road outside Baishi. Chuck Rock opens with a full accuracy shot on Internal Flame and then lowers his accuracy to the middle to fire more quickly. Chuck Rock knows that you get the surprise shot once and only once. Firing in the middle of the bar Chuck scores a hit on Internal Flame then misses his next five shots due to manual evades. Uh-oh, Internal Flame has started dodging. Now Chuck is in a battle to protect his own butt from becoming charred Holtburger, while trying to dump some Water of Lethe to extinguish Interal Flame.

Chuck lowers his accuracy bar further in attempt to fire faster than Internal Flame can dodge, in the process he lowers his skill by 40%. Now when he fires Internal Flame is evading through skill! Chuck realizes that he's in over his head and flees for his life.

In that example I omitted the numbers but you can do the math yourself. A skill of 400 reduced by 40% is 240. Not an impossible level to get missile defense to skill. With buffs alone you can drive your missile defense up by 56 points before minors, moderates or majors. This change is being done to allow Players a chance to lower their bar with far less detriment.

We are being mindful of PvM in this change only to make sure that we don't turn Archers into machine gun killers that obliterate creatures. Since creatures are balanced against the bonus end of the accuracy bar we feel confident that altering the lower end will not have a massive impact on hunting.

Projectile Size

This will require far less explanation. If you have a pin and a ballpoint pen handy. Look at the two. Look at the point of the pin and then look at the tip of the ball point pen. That is about the proportional change that we are making on the projectiles.

They're very, very, small at the moment. So small that a slight step right or left allows a player to completely evade the projectile. Now that little sidestep will result in a strike. Larger evasive maneuvers will still likely result in a miss.

[Myk]

For the projectile size enlargement to really help, change it from the size of a pin to the equiv of about 4-5in across. Archers miss by huge amounts.

[Chrono]

This will NOT make the difference we need.

[KF_AC]

posted by Ibn:
The changes to the Missile slider bar are being done for player versus player play. This change is being made to minimize impact on PvM play while offering an increased usability of missile skills in PvP.

This is very nice, but I wonder if you realize that the major detriment to archery (as well as melee) has been the no-penalty whatsoever to high tinkering.
If you had done so from the start, characters with high tinkered armor and trained missile would not have been so immune to archery attack.
To illustrate what I am talking about, one would think that adding steel to armor would increase the weight of that piece of armor.
A fully tinkered suit would still offer great protection, but would also be heavy enough to cause overburden.
That would hurt the user's missile defense, as it should.

[Evoker II]

Don't mess with the accuracy bar. Instead go with the other idea of increasing the hit zone on arrows

[Ibn]

Originally posted by Spec_LC
Will there be a limit to the amount of accounts you can ban from entering your alleginace just like there is a limit on the amount of people you can squelch?

Probably, yes. We haven't yet determined what that limit will be, but it is unlikely that you'll be able to ban an indefinite number of accounts.

[Ibn]

Originally posted by romside
Would it be possible to build in an list command (maybe officer and monarch only), which lists all people in the chat? Or would that be too much lag when executed?

At the moment the chat system doesn't have the ability to list everyone in a chat room. We hope to have that functionality in the future, at which point we can revisit giving monarchs/officers this ability.

[Ibn]

Originally posted by SCM
The allegiance boot/ban is an excellent idea, & will be a welcome addition in the fight to keep thieves & undesirables out of the respectable clans.

The Officers needs a bit more thought regarding the power to boot/change another.
What can be done if officer 1, elected by the monarch, whom I assume is the other officer, your explanation is not clear on this, takes a dislike to the monarch & removes him/her from the officer position & replaces him/her with a friend?
Does the monarch have the power to override this situation?

All in all the changes look good on paper.

Ah, no, the two officer positions are in addition to the monarch. The monarch can never have these powers stripped.

[Spike Lady]

Orion, I appreciate your explaination, BUT (and that's a big BUT!), what you are proposing is sooo insignificant that why bother with the development time.

Go back to the great circle of life: Archers > Mage > Melee > Archer.

You, in your example, just stated that Mage > Archer. That's backwards. I'm not saying that archers should be total machine guns, but even you suggest that it's viritually impossible to hit the target (the mage) at high accuracy. Umm...isn't HIGH accuracy supposed to mean that you CAN hit them?

I would suggest the slider bar have a secondary function. The SIZE of the projectile. If you want rapid fire, the projectile width is small, if you go full accuracy, then it should be large. At least as large as a war bolt.

The fact that archers can NOT hit ANYONE that moves or twitches, YET mages can twitch all they want and STILL fire their projectile (war).

Archers should be allowed the same movement at full accuracy due to the 'wind up' time. Slide too far, and the shot would be interupted or hit the environment (flubbed).


The only other thing I can think of is to make it so that when you have the 'repeat attcks' turn off, that it really does only shoot one time. I've had it off and have shot more than 3 arrows while stuck in place due to mage lag (slidecasting lag that is caused by the movement and spell animations causing the server to do more than 1 thing at a time for that given location).

I really think if you want to see what I/we mean, make up a lvl 100 archer and go pkl and see how many battles you win. I would guess 1 in 10-15.

[huesofpatience]

Yes please revive towns, I miss the social aspect of AC. Not just going to marketplace, leave that for bots and people looking for live trading, tinkering, and questing for towns =) The critter debuffs set for 2 min seems a little....It would be nicer to have them drop on us sooner of course, but sometimes you might be in a long battle and need the yield to last (pvm wise). So that one is no. I like the consumables being dropped by monsters, now I can stay in battle longer with my no-buff macer and actually loot the monsters ;) All great ideas, but also test the arrow width which I know you will. I love you guys!

[Flipo]

Regarding Officers

Although an officer cannot boot the monarch the officer can boot vassals under the monarch. I suspect that if an officer's account was hacked or had a really bad Asheron's Call day an officer could boot all vassals under monarch. This would pull down the monarch. Lost Monarch Rank means lost mansion. So it sounds possible for an officer to take over monarchy and if done carefully by this officer, can buy the mansion of the now disposed monarch. Monarch of course loosing contents of mansion.

This just means the monarch has to weigh the pro and cons and decide to have officers or not. If monarch decides to have officers then monarch will have to use good judgment on selecting and training their officers.

Monarch does not have to assign any officer correct?

Overall I think this is an ok option. I think most monarchies will assign officers and be ok with the added risks. I can see clans with co-monarchs being happy about this feature.

Future feature would be ability to have monarch set level of the officer.
Level 1: Just they way u have it now.
Level 2: Can boot but cannot do by account.
Level 3: Speaker privileges only.

Would be nice to sneak in someway to keep officer from booting x different toons in a given period of time.

[hanyuning]

I would love to see the ability for those people who have trained/speced lockpick and boosted it REALLY high be able to open the special chests out there. Maybe introduce a new type of lockpick with maybe a few uses that gives the users a chance to open those 5000 difficulty chests. Show lockpickes some love!

[EshuunDara]

On one hand, I like the debuff changes because they mean my vulns will wear off faster... on the other hand, I wouldn't like this applied to the vulns/yields that I cast. I look at it this way: if I want spells that have been cast on me to go away, I use a gem of stillness or cast a dispel; otherwise I just live with it.

I see no reason to change the current functionality -- I understand the disparity, but I don't see this is as a broken dynamic that needs fixing. If you can implement what you are proposing and can make it so that the spells the monsters cast use those durations but players use the current dynamic, I wouldn't mind that, but otherwise I would kindly ask that you not make those changes.

The rest of the stuff however... Looks great. Thanks for all the hard work.

Esh

[knopp]

Originally posted by Spike Lady


BTW: to Knoop. (no) War does more massive damage per hit and is harder to avoid at close range then archers. So your numbers are way off.
If a mage hits me 2 in 10 for 200 pts each, that's 400 pts. If I hit you 1 in 10 for 50, that's a huge difference (50:400 or 1:8) so war does 8 times the damge of bow in PvP.


Spike, if you have major wards, and level 7 protects, I will do 130 a shot, and MAYBE land 2 out of 10, not counting your chance to resist with your free magic d skill. With machine gunning against my missle I dont have trained, you can land at least 3 shots before you even have to tank my war.

I know weepings are the rave, but 166mod CS bows are harsh in PK. you get imp/vuln deadly pierce arrows and you do incredible damage against my paltry 130 per shot, 2 out of 10.

What I am talking about is mostly non-pk settings. IE: VOD critters, Bobo, Gman. All of them archer food for lvl 80's that will 95%+ get the kill over 126+ mages.

To be honest, Archery in close fighting is a rediculous image anyways. You should drop teh bow and come out with a melee weapon, like a dagger.

At that point, you are still 8 credits behind my 1 attack skill, but you still have 2.

[turnstyles]

the creature debuff timer set to 2 minutes is a double edged sword.

on one hand, i will grant that it is annoying to have wrath of harlune layered on you by everything you fight, but i thought that added to the challange. i guess, and it is tentative, that this change will be good, although i would rather creatures be given a broader range of spells at their disposal to cast...

meanwhile, on the other hand, if you want to hunt solo, like this game wonderfully allows you to, and you check out VoD or Caul, 2 minutes is just not enough time for an avatar w/o maxed stats to kill all of the creatures involved. the change in this respect makes the game even harder than the chain casting zefirs with 6000 health made it to begin with :)

in all seriousness, why? what i want from you, turbine, is uniformity. if a debuff needs to have a timer, give them all the same timer. if that means all debuffs last 2 minutes, i cannot complain; one spell getting special treatment is almost as bad as one suspected ucm not getting placed in limbo for the coming test.

[Piley]

Originally posted by knopp
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Gordian
[B]Knopp... you really wonder after what you wrote? sheesh

I don't even understand your #5 comment that is allegedly so important. If you are referring to the cost of War.. *yawn* There is no issue there that has been a significant factor in people leaving the game.


Yes, as a matter of fact I do expect a reply. It was a post with valid questions/comments and deserves as much of an answer as any other post on this forum.

He asked for feedback, and I gave it to him. Just because he may not like it, he should still do SOMETHING.

I didn't see him denying anything I posted. Maybe I hit a real nerve instead of the usual "OMG! MAKE ME MORE LEET PLZ!" posts that abound on these boards.

If Me wanting balance in a game makes me the bad guy, then oh well...

Then what are you asking for? I'm still not sure if I understood your post...

If your saying that The Skill Credits for each Skill in game is out of wack, i would disagree. War is the most powerful and therefore, deserves to be what it is to Spec. If your saying that Bow is the most powerful, and should have war cheaper -- Your ignoring the need for Alchemy/Fletching/Cooking and Addtional Monetary expenses, that would even it out. As far as I can tell, the only possible Skill Credit related item that may be out of wack, is the lack of being able to Spec the Tinker Skills. Everything else is very much in-line with the game design's balance levels.

Piley

[Piley]

Originally posted by knopp
[B]That was my point exactly. You CANNOT change the effectiveness of these attacks without adjusting the credit balance.


They aren't out of balance.


For those of you that dont agree, please understand that you are most likely disagreeing because you are an archer.


Actually, No.. I disagree with you as well.

For the past 6 Months, I've been a Melee almost exclusively... I've got a 177 Brashest X-Bower, a 128 BattleMage, and a Level 101 Tank-Axer, and a Level 111 Tinker-Guy. Guess which is the most powerful and hardest to play? My BattleMage.


And for the guy that spoke earlier about me only wanting mages to get any advancement. I ONLY WANT A CREDIT/DAMAGE RATIO THAT IS TOO FAR OUT OF WHACK READJUSTED! I dont care what template you are, but if you spend 12 credits on xbow, it should do LESS than the 16 credit bow, and MUCH LESS than 28 credit war.


Your right.. X-Bow SHOULD do less damage.. Guess what! IT ALREADY DOES!! You are ignoring that ShotSpeed matters to Bow/X-Bow characters. Bow does a considerable more damage over time than X-Bow does, strickly because of re-load and re-shoot speed.


Follow your trend Turbine and balance these things as you have before.


I'm sure they will... If there ever is a need for it, which currently doesn't exist.



Fix the game on your own time Turbine. The players pay to PLAY AC, not watch you TRY and FAIL to fix it over and over. When you get everyting together, then fix it, until then, please spare the populace the BETA TESTING ENVIRONMENT.


You do realise that this is a MMORPG, of which what you are asking is an impossability, right...?

Piley

[MimsterofMT]

If level 7 creature spells were reduced to 2 minute duration...

-I no longer have a reason to spec'd creature.
-Futility helps both my vulner and war spelss to stick.
-I cannot kill high lvl monsters in 2 minutes or less.

With the announced changes in dispelling I see no reason to change the length of negative lvl 7 spells to 2 mins., 4 is fine
You could change monster AI to cast dispell on themselves more.

I do think the length of lvl 6 and below spells should be reduced. I fear lvl 6 debuffs moer than lvl 7 ones already.

Thanks,
Mimster

[Zedon]

It all sounds fine to me, don't change what you've stated.

[pacesetter]

Ya startin to make it hard to find something to complain about!

keep it up!

[Piley]

I would rather the Debuff Timers be identical to every type of spell, instead of having Creature Spells be limited to 2 minutes.

Why? It's considerably harder for someone to Solo high end stuff with only 2 minutes, and it makes for Powerleveling harder to get done with lowerlevel characters. Plus, it just "Seems out of Wack" when looked at against Life Magic.

After all, there are a lot of creatures that I use my Creature Magic to debuff with and would rather not have to deal with the problem of expiring debuffs...


Piley

BTW -- I'm still asking for consideration of being able to SPEC TINKER SKILLS!

[Spike Lady]

I think most people agree that 2 min is just way to short.

In a quest environment, having to Yield, Fester, Sword Inept, etc... on Gearlan, means that you will have to have a mage up top debuffing constantly. Because as soon as you get him debuffed, they will wear off. Since he has ALOT of health, you are making it that much harder to kill him.

How about Mowan? Mages again will have to constantly debuff. And if they have to regen their mana? ooops...there goes the Fester. guess we gotta pound on him while the mage regens so that we can continue the fight.

I would rather that spells did not stack. What should happen is that when you get debuffed again by the same spell, that the first spell goes away and the newest one is where the timer is. So if you do a dispell, it would be effective.

Length of critter debuffs are not that much of an issue. We should be able to dispell level VIIs though. And I believe that is coming soon.

[Hosagi]

We are considering using these times for Life and Item negative spells only, and making all negative Creature spells last exactly 2 minutes, regardless of level. Negative Creature spells can be particularly annoying when cast by creatures, and do not directly increase damage when cast by players. We’d like to hear your feedback on this topic.
the life debuff timers are cool but please dont nerf the critter debuffs there are critters that when solo'd take longer than 2 mins to kill and i dont know about everyone else but i didnt join AC to be forcedx to hunt in a fellowship

[Phades_TLS]

I think there should be a slight change in the debuff idea proposed.

As of now the debuff times are ok for PvM. During PvM you can dispell at any time. Some people rely on the longer debuff times of lvl 6s with the loss of debuffing power of 7s to work their enemies.

However, in PvP, the dispell ability has been reduced. You will not be able to gem while in PvP combat. That's good. In that case, with the loss of dispelling the decreased debuff times will balance out.

Some would argue that they liked the lvl 6s (which some do) as opposed to 7s just for the long debuff time. With the ability to dispell yourself and others, the long times are quite high. The longer debuff times of lvl 6s were used to catch and kills those that just escape battles-- in 1v1 nothing changes. However, with the increased power to kill coming... then the fight lenghts should lower as well.. making the long debuffs unneccessary in pvp combat.

Though, just have to keep sure you lower fight times by balancing out character power vs character endurance. Disabling gemming is one step in the right direction and my suggestion compliments it.

======================
Character balancing:

The increased ability of archers with the increased projectile physics is a good idea. However, make sure it is tested. SKILL should still out reign. A fighter with SKILL should still be able to effectively fight an archer without missle D...... as well as the other templates vs themselves and opposing templates.

SKILL and the ability to dodge make AC the most popular online gaming environment. There's no point and click. If someone swings low, you can jump. Someone shoots at you, you can sidestep to evade while preparing for a return attack, etc... Keep this idea alive throughout all rebalancing. AC pwns DAoC and the rest...

=================


P.S. Staff and other unused skills need some love. Hehe, i'm the only staffer on DT that I know of. How many other PK's use [weeping] staff in hopes it will get better?

[Strider]

I love the idea of allegiance binding to a town but why do you want to devalue owning a mansion even more? You already did that when you allowed allegiance recalling to villas. Thought you were going to try to upgrade the value of owning a mansion instead of devaluing it more. Oh yeah thats right you gave mansions the hookable portal. Course you also left in a bug allowing anyone to hook one anywhere long enough that any homeowner should have had plenty time to get one. Come on, mansion owners pay 1 mil and 10 writs per month versus 100k and 2 writs for villas. And for what? What do you guys smoke when you get togeather and think up these things?

Uninscribing items is terrible in my opinion. Why bother to have a envoy do it if gonna allow that. Just make any item inscribable by anyone, anytime. Inscripts are useless now. If someone doesn't want to return an item they find with someone elses inscript on it, then let them use it like that. Don't allow them to wipe the inscript and sell or use without others knowing who "made" it or actually did the quest to earn it.


Not sure about this but didnt see it so will ask. Since yall think a mage using a wand should get benefit of melee and missile d mods will melee weapons get the same treatment? Will we see a missile mod and magicd mod on a sword/ua/axe/bow/spear/etc?


Striderlongshanks

[Jet-eye-nite]

Again I wonder why this game is 90/10 for pvp ? this is response to pvp speed setting for archers . I think there are a few of us that play the game under the pvm portion ,although the game continues to retort to pvp . :confused:

[cstanleytech]

Why not just do one minute per level of spell instead ?
That way it makes more sense and the max time for a level 7 vuln a player casts on a monster would be 7 minutes.
As for monsters casting spells on players if possible reduce the timer on those to 2 minutes.

[Celestin]

Um, 7 minutes is a bit long...perhaps 30 second per level would be more reasonable? Would cause 7s to last 3.5 minutes, plenty long enough in most cases. As for critter debuffs, 2 minutes or 3.5 minutes makes little difference, as 9 times out of 10, if a critter debuff is a problem for me, it will be renewed within 2 minutes anyways, shorter timer won't help by much.

[scorcher]

they are all good ideas.

the heal/revitalize spells could be boosted a bit more for level VII, seven points more just isnt anything, its like getting a raise for a dime. I guess i cant complain about a raise but maybe make it 115-140 for health and 130-200 for stamina. Thanks

[Jape]

I think most people agree that 2 min is just way to short.

In a quest environment, having to Yield, Fester, Sword Inept, etc... on Gearlan, means that you will have to have a mage up top debuffing constantly. Because as soon as you get him debuffed, they will wear off. Since he has ALOT of health, you are making it that much harder to kill him.

I dont.

Mages cant currently hurt high level quest monsters. (mage does 300-400 damage per war. Archer or melee hits it for 1500). So i dont see this affecting questing at all.

Mages keep the boss mob debuffed and vulned, melees and archers kill it. Goes as it always has so far.

Inepts and vulns now last 2min, and thats really good change imo because now those annoying inepts drop lot faster than they used to. They just need to change it so that if you already have a debuff, mob cannot cast same debuff on you again until it expires.

[Wazoot]

This will kill a mages soloing ability in the higher levels.

I am leveling a mage and need a yield to stick longer than 2 minutes for me to kill things in VoD. Those who can spend billions on their skills to hunt w/o a yield will do fine but I haven't the time to invest that much time. I know VoD is meant for groups but I like the challenge of hunting there.

[Ibn]

Originally posted by Flipo
Monarch does not have to assign any officer correct?[/B]

Correct. It's entirely possible that many monarchies may choose not to use officers at all. It's an option.

[Mantis]

Not to sound like a fanboi, but I love it all. Everything there is something that would make the game more enjoyable for me.

I like the idea of an allegiance bindstone and would use it frequently, it would be nice to have a town that was kind of "ours" again.

The physics on the missile weapons is something that I think will take more work than just changing the size of the object itself, but hey, you've gotta start somewhere and small moves is the best way to find balance in this kind of situation.

I've said for a looong time that debuffs timers are wierd and should be changed. Those timers make sense to me, though it seems that critter debuffs should be the same as life/item, but I'm sure you all have your reasons.

Anyways, thanks for reading =)

[knopp]

Level 7 buff = 60 minutes at 300 skill level to cast.
Level 7 de-buff = 2 minutes at 325 skill level to cast.

If this were to happen, the debuffs should have to be more powerful than they are now. I dont know, but a harder spell to cast that lasts 1/30th of its counterpart should do more than they do now.

Back to balance issues. The balance of AC is very delicate. It has in past times been left for LONG times out of whack. I would just like to see these changes INCLUDE balancing the game back to where it was 3 years ago. The game today forces you into 3-4 templates to be competitive where there are THOUSANDS of possible templates.

That isnt right.

Mage, archer, melee whatever. It all needs to be looked at for rebalancing. And to the guy that said about taking other things like alchemy/fletching and such on your archer. Let me remind you that they are OPTIONAL skills like tinkering and lockpick. You do not NEED those skills to be effective in AC, and I can guarantee I spend alot more in overhead for plats/tapers/mana stones than you do for your arrows.

All offensive attacks need to be balanced on highest damage = highest cost. Defenses should also be balanced the same.

There are alot of deep broken mechanics in AC, and I know it would be horrid to try and fix them all. That is what AC2 should have fixed, but oh well...

Dont flame or whine about me wanting things to be fair. I can honestly say that on my highest level mage that I have never done over 1000 points on 1 shot, where my level 60 archer has done well over 1500 in 1 shot.

The easiest fix for the archer complaint is to let them slide-shoot like mages can. Make arrows have the same impact size as war shots, so they will be like mages with a bow. BUT, make the reload time equal to casting level 7 spells at MAX, and level 1 spell at MIN. Break it down after that for damage on the slider.

If you arent careful in this, you are going to see a swarm of archers being rerolled simply because it will be stupid to make anything else. If an archer can land 70% for damage comparable to War, there is a serious balance issue there.

[Frieze]

I'm excited about the treasure revisions and the lowering of debuff timers etc :D

Heal/Revit improvements sound great too, and so does all of the TOWN LOVE :) I can't wait for Bindstones, closer LS/Portal Drops/Meeting Halls and more appropriate Scrivners.

About the proposed creature debuff timers:

2 minutes does sound about right.

MOST monsters don't take more than two minutes to kill, and MOST of the time we don't cast creature debuffs, either. But, for solo mage-play in VoD/Caul, it might be a hindrance to re-cast that yield so often.

My stance on this is pretty back and forth. On one hand, I want the yields cast on ME to be shorter. On the other hand, I could see a lot of whining over magic yield being 2 minutes.

If it is feasible, having magic yield timers on monsters last the same as life debuff timers, while on players, they expire after 2 minutes, might be a good compromise. I am doubting that could happen though :(

[Frieze]

Originally posted by knopp
my level 60 archer has done well over 1500 in 1 shot. lol, WHERE, on a Rampager with a Rending Bow?!

Or, was it on a VoD mob? Wait, my mistake, couldn't possibly be. There's no way a level 60 archer could *hit* anything in VoD more than 1 time out of 20.

By my math, your high level mage would do a far higher DoT than an archer who can't even hit the target in question reliably, let alone, if he is hitting it for 1500, he didn't vuln it himself. If you are really going to compare a level 60 archer to an upper-limit mage, do it right. The archer's DoT is going to be about ZERO on a VoD creature, if he can even hit it. If he does hit it, since he can't vuln it, it would be for what... 30??

Besides, VoD is a tiny slice of the big picture, and with ring spells, in (NON olthoi/hollow) dungeons, mage DoT is far greater than that of ANY other class.

I've gone through this before with you, and you'll continue to bring up the cost of War Magic on threads where it has NO place, I guess. But, for argument's sake let's say war costs 12 credits to spec. That would leave an extra 26 credits on a tri-spec!!! mage template (CLaW). With an extra 26 credits, you could train all 4 tinker skills, lockpick, AND healing. And, as it stands on a CLaW mage you have the extra credits to train lockpick and lore.

If mages had more skills to choose from, I would be all for lowering war's cost. But as it stands, they would have nothing to do with their credits. (Defense skills? Yeah right, 10/10 coord/quick is going to make for a very crappy skill, even with defender on wands).

Besides, Knopp, tell me honestly, would you like it if every melee and archer trained war TOO, because its credit cost was lowered? War Magic is a skill you need to plan your template around, NOT a secondary skill to pick up. So, seriously, stop the credit whining.

[Epim-MT]

Critter Debuff Timers: I play several different toons. In fact, I have one of each. All melee weapons, all missile weapons, a life/war spec mage and a life/crit/item spec mage with no war or (Useable)weapon skill. A 2 minute timer for critter debuffs would be nice from a melee point of view, but then I can use dispel potions or gems to loose the debuffs anyway. I think that a set scale should be in place. A level 6 adjusts a skill by 35 points, and a level 7 by 40. Therefore it would seem to make sense that the interval between a 5 and a 6 be the same from a 6 to a 7. I would suggest a debuff lasting for 30 seconds per level of the spell. A 7 would last 3 minutes 30 seconds, just 30 seconds short of the current 4 minutes, but the 6 would see a significant drop of 5 minutes.

Recovery Spells: I cast my vote for Yew Wan Sum (sorry if I butchered the name) Make a heal spell roughly the equivalent of a war spell as far as base damage/healing goes. This would open more spells as well. There could be stardard heals (110-180) and "streak"heals (26-52) that cast at level 1 speed. The same would go for Harm Other. It should do as much as a war spell since there is no vuln for it.

Missile Changes: Adjusting the lowest accuracy upward by 10 will have litte effect on missile toons in PVM. Nearly anything you can hit on fast attack isn't worth wasting an arrow/bolt/dart anyway. A much better thing to add would be the ability to lead the target the way mage spells can. Currently, missile weapons follow the same trajectory as an arc spell. Given the effects of gravity this is fine. The problem comes from the fact that a mage can cast a bolt (I think) and hit where a moving target "should" be by the time it gets there. Archers should have this same ability Perhaps divide the accuracy bar into three sections. The lowest end would use "streak" trajectories, and be fast but still uselessly inaccurate. The middle would follow the arcing trajectory of an arc spell, and the final, most accurate third, would be able to lead the target for maximum chance of getting a hit, in return for taking time to really aim. If that is not possible, then maybe some check boxes for the different attack types.

Allegiance Changes: I would change two things about the boot/ban feature. I agree that this is a good thing to have, but please consider the following: If the monarch has no idea who the other toons on the account getting booted are, a small (rank 6) monarch could end up dumping his rank and loosing the mansion. Worse yet would be an officer doing it. My suggestion would be that before a boot/ban takes efffect, the offending account be put on probation. No access to the mansion, no mansion recall, but not out for 24 hours. This way the accused can have a chance for redemption. Officers could place an account on probation, but only a monarch can boot some one. The second change would be that the monarch wouls get a screen like the new tinker success screen to tell them the outcoem of the boot. If you boot 666, your rank will drop from 7 to 5 and you will loose 54 total followers. Do you wish to boot this person?

A final thought on the rebalancing talk on this thread. I have seen a lot of talk about the damage a crossbow can do compared to a bow, and that a crossbow's damage is too high. Bows shoot faster. I think it balances out in the end. I think it's odd though that so many people are going from bow to crossbow, when thrown has advantages over both. Points and damage are identical to crossbow, ammunition is 80% of the burden, and the rate of fire is faster. until rendering came along a TW with spikes could do 66% of the damage of an atlatl but carry twice the ammo. I love TW and my thower is one of my favorite toons ever, but TW is frightenenly overpowered compared to bow and crossbow. (but don't tell turbine) heh heh

Personally, I would like to see an ovehaul of the melee weapons to include paired weapons, multistrike UA, spears to have the respect they are due*, two handed axes and swords, and a real represetation of a staff. Staff= two hands and killer melee D bonus. A one handed staff is a stick, see mace.

*The Chinese regard the spear as the "King of Weapons". When a culture that has turned out as many weapons and fighting methods over that many centuries gives sucha label, there's probably a reason. As for Western references... There are very few recordfs of any melee weapon other than a spear used for hunting.

[knopp]

Ill tell you what, ill stop my credit whining when my lvl 146 BM can get the kill on Mowen/Gman against a lvl 100 archer.

Bow does just as much damage as a mage if you have a clue what you are doing. Not to mention the fact that you can adjust to get less evades, where as my 431 war skill is CONSTANTLY resisted OUTSIDE of VoD.

When was the last time a Grotek Titan evaded YOU 9 times in a row at your full power?

Orion has already stated that war will get a boost to justify the credit cost. I am just saying that whenever something gets a boost or nerf, there should be a skill credit readjustment also.

Like dagger should be 1 credit to spec because of the complete worthlessness of it. And bow should be 10/8. War should be 12/12.

[Frieze]

Knopp, does that mean I should whine until my 136 archer can get more kills than a level 50 mage using rings in the white wasp dungeon? It's called strengths and weaknesses. If you are going to base your whining on ONE type of creature (high health) that makes up less than 5% of the game, you may be bashing your head against the wall for a long long time.

Orion stated war needs a boost - because it does (in PvM). However, he didn't say a word about credit cost, I guarantee. I'm awaiting a link where he indeed said that. (I'll be waiting forever).

If you go looking through his posts, you will also find that he said "Archers are right where we want them (PvM)" - and as I've played a dagger character recently and it has just had two upgrades, it is not useless. :p

[Myrdyn]

I really dont think Archers need any help.

when PKL with 400 base amuli buffed with 7's and lvl 7 prots im am still been critted for 120+ on zero accuracy that very painfull, I like a fighting chance, making it easier for them i dont belive is correct.

Unless you balance it with the weeping bow not been shield hollow.

[Dom on TD]

Originally posted by Orion

In that example I omitted the numbers but you can do the math yourself. A skill of 400 reduced by 40% is 240. Not an impossible level to get missile defense to skill. With buffs alone you can drive your missile defense up by 56 points before minors, moderates or majors. This change is being done to allow Players a chance to lower their bar with far less detriment.

We are being mindful of PvM in this change only to make sure that we don't turn Archers into machine gun killers that obliterate creatures. Since creatures are balanced against the bonus end of the accuracy bar we feel confident that altering the lower end will not have a massive impact on hunting.


Why not just make missile def unusable like the magics? That way if people PvP against archers they'll have to train missile to evade + it won't impact PvM. I never evade the lugies anyways. I'm not a big fan of PK, but I AM tired of archers taking the kills on everything big: ie Bobo, Gaerlan, and any boss Golem except a Crystal Lord. Allowing them to rapid fire with more accuracy will only hurt non archers even more on quests where the kill gets the good reward.

1 other thing.... Why is everything going shield hollow? Seems like you're taking away the melee's only advantage.

BTW I like everything else I read, with the small exception of Allegiance Officers being able to appoint and remove other Allegiance Officers. That should be a Monarch Only command. If not, then The other officers shouldn't be able to remove an officer appointed by the Monarch.

[arboc77]

Topic: Speed / Accuracy Slider Change to -40% to +50%

Don't waste your time.

A -40% penalty will drop effective hunting skill the same number of monster levels as a -50% penalty.

The change will be imperceptible, so work on something that has an actual benefit.

[Jape]

>>I know VoD is meant for groups but I like the challenge of hunting there.

Seems that you like the xp more than the challenge. If you like the challenge, you should thank devs because they just gave you some more challenge.

If you cant kill VoD mobs in 2mins, try Caul. You should get more xp in caul than in VoD anyways.

And i think they should increase VoD difficulty a lot. That place should NOT be soloable. At any level.

[knopp]

Originally posted by Frieze
Knopp, does that mean I should whine until my 136 archer can get more kills than a level 50 mage using rings in the white wasp dungeon?

No, actually you can chalk up area effect spells as one of the added costs of war magic over bow.

You cannot blame your overkill on a small creature on game mechanics. I can kill bunnies in 1 shot with a fire rend wand, and a lvl 7 war, but a lvl 2 archer will get the kill over me simply because he can shoot faster than my lvl 7 war winds up.

Overkill does not count where credit costs are concerned.

[Yggdrasill]

Creature Debuff timer shrinking....

How about leaving critter where it is. Or better, make the spells levels step up by level, not down from six to seven.
As a mage of long standing and multiple refits, I feel that any more weakening of the times, strengths or effectivness of spells will really do little for those individuals that quest for such changes.
There are currently three methods of dispelling debuffs. One is a gem, another is a friend with the proper casting ability/device, and three is time. Of all of the methods, the Derethians I have the benefit of playing with use time, most of the time. Granted there are instances where the Gems and casting come in handy, I use them myself, but as a mage, reducing the time "Futility" is effective in VOD or Caul will mean lack of playability for my mage, which is my main characture.
If this method of "equalizing" the charature professions is for those PK types that need a break from the more powerful of my bretheren, then please keep the nerf to the Darktide server and let those would be PK'ers partake of the madness there. If it is for the sake of those that do not enjoy magic as a profession, let them use those methods that already are available.
As for the buffing times and other niceties that are mentioned, they sound nice, five minutes buffing instead of nine each hour of play. I see that as a benefit more for those of the "hobby-mage" melee type that I play with that "buff their own". But everybody that buffs will benefit and it will give those that currently rely on others a reason to strive for the skill.
Town usage? The folks I play with generally always gather in town before the quest and after prior to post quest hunting. We've been using the same town for years (real time) and have found no real reason to change. We do have a few large level allegiance meetings though and those are usually at allegance housing for the privacy of those types of meetings. Prior to the housing we'd use the meeting hall.
I suppose a more interactive NPC would be a bit more engaging and might bring some back to the towns but the novelty in that would soon where off. (Time for flame fodder!) The best bet would be to bring the vendors back to the towns and eliminate the marketplace. If the bots of the market were spread about a bit, it would give users a reason to visit each town looking for the particular item that the so desperately desire. Perhaps rent store front spaces like is currently done with housing and require the account holder to play the vendor with taxes and what not. It might bring the value back to the pyreal coins.

Thats my 99 cents.....

[Doc Feelgood]

Doc Feelgood here...

This is my first time on your board, but not my first time commenting on your design work.

I maintain a website for my monarchy on WE (Darkcrystal).

HTTP://www.whiteworld.com/lord-ash/we

which does a good job of chronicalling what you've been doing since the start of the WE server.

Here are some specific things I think you need to be paying attention to:

a) Control your inflationary tendancies. You are obsoleting all your past good work every time you ratchet up an aspect of the game.

b) Nerf buffing. I waste a ton of time each game cycle getting buffed. Nerf buffing and let magic jewlery/armor/clothing carry the buff load instead. This will also reduce the game's now-heavy dependance on Decal-related plug-ins.

That's enough said for now. If you want to see more, please check out my essay called Warts on the Face of Dereth.

HTTP://www.whiteworld.com/lord-ash/warts.htm

Keep on designing!

Doc Feelgood

[Helbereth]

Allegiance Bindstones.

The monarchy I'm in has meetings occasionally. These kinds of meetings are usually held in the mansion (or villa) basement. These meetings will probably be held in the same manor, as will allegiance buffbots et cetera. That's just about the only real reason we need mansions - for privacy and free buffs.

Mansions and Villas are great, but there are no vendors there. After I get done hunting - and I'm pretty sure most players do this - I head into my favorite town and sell off the junk I picked up, maybe buy trade notes, and turn in any trophies I may have collected. I think it'd be cool if there was actually someone in town to BS with while I clean up my packs.

This could also bring multiple allegiances together. There are more monarchies than there are towns I would surmise, and most monarchies will want their bind town to be one with decent buy/sell rates. So I could see multiple monarchies choosing the same town. I could see people centering toward the bind recall - especially since it will be a quick access recall to a town thereby freeing up your lifestone tie for a more remote location.

As of now the only places you see extramonarchy activities are in marketplace or the PK/L battles in Ayan. Drawing people from different monarchies into one place could result in cross-monarchy quests and events. All in all this sounds like a good idea.


Allegiance Tools

I have 2 complaints on this:

1. Officers having the ability to boot/appoint eachother. That should be a monarch only option.

2. The storage in the mansion is the monarch's storage. Only he/she should have the ability to alter the access lists.

The rest sounds good. Being able to boot certain troublemakers from the chat or ban them from the allegiance entirely sounds especially helpful.

One thing I'd like to suggest is a way for people online in the monarchy to see who else is on. In a fellowship you can see whoever is in the fellow just by checking the fellow panel. It would be nice to b able to see if (insert name here) is online without having to ask on the channel and look like an idiot. You might even devise a way to differentiate officers from other members on the list so that newbies know who to ask to get straight answers.

Another thing that just hit me is a way to have a 'court' of sorts. It would only really work if the online list was added. You'd have the Monarch in charge, the Officers with the tools and the Highlighted Court members who can be looked to as advisors. Assigned by the monarch or officers, the court would get a highlighted color on the allegiance list, or perhaps a special character before their name when they speak in allegiance chat.

For instance:
[Allegiance] Newbie says, "Can someone help me?"
[Allegiance] -C- Court Member says, "What do you need help with?"
[Allegiance] -M- Monarch says, "What's up, bud?"
[Allegiance] -O- Officer says, "Anything I can help with?"

Most monarchies have more than 3 core members, and having a way for those cores to be easily identified would help newbies get answers to stupid questions.


Negative Spell timers.

The negative spell timers - if you're going to alter them - should all be the same. Sure reducing the timer on them may make it less annoying when you get debuffed, but it also reduces the amount of time you have to take something down once you cast futility.

2 Minutes is NOT a long time when you're facing off with something that has 18,000 health and a tendency to chaincast wars (Diamond Golem Suzrians for example). As it is I usually have to recast futility half way through.

You also might consider moving the time table up a bit in comparison to the proposed setup.

Something like:

Spell Level....Time (min:sec)
1...................1:30
2...................2:15
3...................3:00
4...................3:45
5...................4:30
6...................5:15
7...................6:00

Level 7 debuffs suck. They are huge problems when facing critters with high magic defense especially. Still, shortening the time they last merely makes it easier to wait them out between battles. I think incresing the timers on these debuffs would add fuel to the dispel spell changes that were mentioned a few months ago. It will also make it easier to take down big health critters by extending the time your debuffs last and reducing the need to recast them.


Ranged weapon changes.

I think altering the slider at the low end sounds like a good idea. The change will be neglidgeable, but it will make shooting down those hordes of annoying, lag-inducing critters overloading most quest dungeons a little easier to manage.

As for the physics change I have to ask why this wasn't part of the game originally... The shaft is meant as a stabilizer in flight. The arrowhead itself - often broader than the shaft - is what does the damage.

As for how arrows fly, they do lead shots like bolt spells except they can arc over a hill or other obstruction. Arc spells shoot at where the target is the instant it leaves your hand. Arrows mark the spot the moving target will be and are much more accurate.

It's the landforms that mess with arrows. If you hunt outdoors and an enemy is moving toward you, the arrow will lead to where the enemy will be if it continues on the plane it's running across. Unfortunately, a lot of times they reach a hill and change tragectory after you fire, causing a miss.

I don't think it's in the programming for the game to predict the sudden tragectory change of the target. That may be a failing of the programming but it's something I think we're stuck with.

Buffing Improvements

Thank you, God! Less downtime more kill time yay!


Loot Changes

The 'art' items you mention I noticed have been making lower level loot more popular. Things like bowls and mugs and things of that nature are a prime source of things like porcelain and granite (the latter being the reason people have been hunting the 1-60 zones). I think adding them to higher loot will do 2 things; Make opening corpses more worth while to some extent since there's a better chance of finding granite, and get some of those die-hard granite miners out of the forking trail and on to VoD.

If you remove pyreals from the higher categories you might consider tossing in some peas. Peas, I think, are what was driving the pyreal economy ever since the monster redistribution. Them being practically removed from all loot levels almost completely was a shock. I would hope that in these changes you're not only going to improve the quality of the miscellaneous items dropped, but the frequency.

Heal/Revitalize Changes

I've always thought 100 health (lv 7) for the time it takes to cast those spells was a bit of a waste. Another 10 points is a step in the right direction.

The revitalize spells are useful for any class. Mages use stamina for everything, melees and archers use revit to save on potions. Increasing the amount you get for these spells will cut down on downtime between battles.


Conclusion:

Looks like a good group of ideas. Thanks for scrapping that stupid settlement portal removal proposition.

[-D-W-]

I think that the debuff spell duration changes are neutral in nature. As a large number of us now hunt in the Caul or in the VOD, our battles are lasting longer periods. Debuff durations now matter to us in PVM. This change will equal out in the end.

However I think that the proposed 2 minute creature debuff timer is an incredibly bad idea. We use magic yield, defenselessness, and vulnerability often. This significant reduction in duration will effectively nerf Creature specialization, which is only necessary for creature debuffs.

I think a change that significantly reduces the effectiveness of every specialized creature magic template is wrong and unnecessary.

Keep Creature the same as life and item. Unless you are planning to reduce the cost of specializing creature magic, don't preferentially reduce the effectiveness of creature debuffs.

[jonas_salk]

Don't get rid of pyreal peas in the mundane loot table... I have also enjoyed finding that rare gem

[Ibn]

Originally posted by jonas_salk
Don't get rid of pyreal peas in the mundane loot table... I have also enjoyed finding that rare gem

Pyreal Peas will still be in the loot table at wealth rating 6, where they are now.

[Ibn]

Just a note regarding the proposed shorter Creature Enchantment timers -- after reading your feedback and investigating further, we've decided not to implement this idea. Creature Enchantment debuffs will have the same timers as other debuffs of the same level.

This will be announced in the May LttP but I thought I'd post it here, now, as well.

[Bruiserk]

Originally posted by Ibn
Just a note regarding the proposed shorter Creature Enchantment timers -- after reading your feedback and investigating further, we've decided not to implement this idea. Creature Enchantment debuffs will have the same timers as other debuffs of the same level.

This will be announced in the May LttP but I thought I'd post it here, now, as well.

That is good to hear.

Now do something about leveling trade mules and tinkers. Remove the time sworn requirement, and raise the XP pass-through for grandpatrons. The XP changes don't have to be like they were before, but they also don't have to be as draconian as the system is now.

[belsamber]

If you want people to gather in towns you need to make them more functional, more useful to the players. A bankiing system would bring people to town in a hurry. When I am concentrating on buying somthing expencive and am building up reserves I often find my self running out of storage slots, if we had an all Derith banking system, we could put our cash in the bank and not have to worry about it.

[Ashikaga]

I was a bit disappointed when I read the planned PVP changes for archers.

On the face of it the changes look more like a token effort. I guess we will have to see how they play in practice.

Is there any intention to review the scalablity and speed/animation of healing?

Archers don't have an Aegis and usually don't have many major wards (GSC weight is usually prohibitive for low strength archers). 200+ hits from War spells are common.

Healing is often unreliable at this level of damage, the amount healed varies greatly (you might have to do 3 heals to recover 200 health) and the animation is slow and glitchy (swap to peace mode, 1-3 heals if you don't fail (unlikely) and reload bow - all while dodging in a small radius).

Also, is there any chance of reviewing the archer animation in general? Archers have the longest, glitchiest wand-bow etc transitions of any character type.

To the people complaining about the cost of War. If you compare War to Bow then the price is very comparable. War's synnergy with Life means that you dont need Healing. In the comparison Bow is worth 26 points (i.e. 16 points spec bow + 4 fletching + 6 Healing). In fact the slow speed of healing with Bow pretty much makes melee defence a requirement for archers too.

btw. Its a good move not decreasing the timers on Critter debuffs to 2 minutes.

[Adi]

I like all the changes that have been planned. However, nothing has been said about the Zone changes and these have been quite frustrating.

It can take me as much as 30 mins to log in, with repeated attempts to connect. Timeouts, messages that I do not have a valid account or subscription, and continued connections to Zone Messenger that I never use are quite irritating.

Is there any chance that the login will ever be simplified and that we will ever loose the Zone altogether? I've even had times that the Zone will completely refuses any connection, including that of viewing web pages.

[Ibn]

Adi, Jessica's Transition Update (http://ac.turbinegames.com/index.php?page_id=231) has a lot of info on just that topic.

[Ghent]

It seems to me that a command that lets a monarch ban an entire account may go too far and limit playstyles.

While not everyone chooses to play AC in a competitive fashion, many do, and part of competition between allegiances is spying. Any monarchy can keep out spies under the current system through careful management, and once a spy is discovered, they can kick that spy out.

Allowing a monarch to boot an entire account allows the monarch to get rid of spies they _haven't_ discovered.

Vagabond/thief/stealth characters have had almost no real existence in AC since day 1, and so sneaking into monarchies is really the only cloak and dagger RP that anyone can enjoy. Monarchs have all the tools they need to protect themselves already. Why give them extra power that they really don't need?

[AC_Addict]

Originally posted by Bhodi Amashi
The allegiance account boot/ban is long overdue...but most welcome nonetheless!

As a word of warning, current monarchs must be very, very, very careful as to who they appoint as an officer.

Yeah I see the officer thing opening the way for more allegiances being head up by multiple people....maybe couples.

It also would be useful for monarchs with second accounts.

[Hidalgo]

I for one like most all of the changes you guys have had and are making to the game. the only things I have always wanted to see, that I dont think have ever been suggested are simply making the armor a bit more even in terms of power. Everyone wears amuli since it protects just as good as anything else and buffs FAR faster. I want my Celdon hauberk :) Also I would like to see some type of skills for melee and archer types. Playing AC2 a bit and the Lineage 2 beta I saw that all characters had neat looking and powerful skills. In AC1 currently my sword toon just does the same ol sword swing which is boring, and my archer isnt much better although he has elemental arrows and such, it just isnt the same. What makes this ok in other games is that it has a slow recharge time. Because it would be very unfiar to give an archer an exploding arrow he could fire over and over quickly :) Changing the width of my arrows, I love this idea but am worried it might make me hit trees and such alot more often. Binding stones or monarchs getting allegiance ties, either way is a great idea. Implement it however you like and I'll be happy.

[Ozaka-LC]

My apologies if this idea has been brought up already...

Several weeks ago there was discussion about possibly moving settlement portals to the meeting halls, or eliminating them entirely. Also, about placing settlement portal gem vendors in settlments or having the gems purchased in towns.

Lots of opinions and I won't recapitulate them here, but many people didn't like the idea of "Bob the Settlement Portal Gem Vendor" hanging around outside their house. But what if the settlement signs were to give you a portal gem (or a stack of portal gems) on a timer?

Assuming the settlement portals were removed and portal gems could NOT be purchased in town, this would encourage travel and limit the "using portals to get everywhere" effect that we have today. It would be harder to get around Dereth, but not overly difficult to make regular runs to favorite areas since you can just pick up a new gem or stack of gems each time you use one.

Personally, I'm not sure I like the idea of removing the settlement portals, but if that's what Turbine is thinking about doing, this might be an alternative to previously mentioned gem ideas.

[Ibn]

Closing this thread as the May LttP has further updates on these topics.