Please join us Friday, February 5th at 3:00 PM Central (20:00 GMT) for our monthly Hangout of the Avatar! Richard, Starr, and Chris will be chatting about Release 26 and looking ahead to Release 27! And as usual, FireLotus will be taking your questions and feedback live in the chat-room and also in advance right here in the comments section.*
We will be giving out some really awesome prizes during the 90 minute extended Hangout, and all you have to do to qualify for one is to come hang out with us in the IRC chatroom during the broadcast. Be sure to join us!
I seriously regret missing. Ugh, need to pay more attention to announcements. Woe.
I would like to know if Tanks(Heavy Armor wearers) could get some type of AOE taunt as a tool for aggro management in a future release?
smart idea!
Question: Can we get more Obsidian assets, like the thrones, the lights, and the large city walls found in Desolis?
Question: Can we get some emotes or effects in the add-on store? For example, an effect that will make your hands glow with dark smokey necromancer magic but that doesn’t take up a spot in your inventory? Or an emote of verbal and semantic spell casting?
Question: I love the new walls sets, but there are not enough straight pieces. Could you please consider offering a new set that is only straight pieces?
I would support this. I would like to see Straight with and without Towers.
Q: Is the Kobold house going to have a matching iron fence set?
I would so love to be there but unfortunately my work schedule does not work out as I am Mon-Fri 7am-530pm CST every week
Hope you all have fun without me, wish I had an opportunity to be there!
very very happy with r26, combat was great still a bit buggy.
please keep focus on the game play piece!
when will we see mark and recall type spells, and could this point to a inscription type skill tree?
+1
+1
+1
QUESTION:
How will the game world context be preserved if it “releases” before the actual story content is complete? It feels like the world itself will lose its immersion and become disconnected without the two combined?
QUESTION:
Excitedly looking ahead to Final Lot Selection – any chance of a temporary Town Crier placed in Soltown who could list all available lots in all NPC Cities, just for that period of time? It would be quite a time-saver!
+1
With the ability for POT owners to choose the entrance for their scene, can we revisit the idea of renaming the “Town Crier and Banker” NPC to ” Visitor Center” and have him put in some sort of pre-fab welcome booth?
I’d actually like the ability to just rename my town crier to an actual name.
Ideally, I’d love to see all vendors customizable in the same manner as player characters, and have a “Paper Doll” allowing the owner to dress them as desired.
Nice!
I agree with Rufus. That is a great idea.
+1
+1
With the introduction of ranged attack targeting, the combat system is another step closer to ditch manual target. Is it planned to do so, and make SotA combat to rely solely on “action” targeting in a not so distant future, like Tera and most modern RPGs?
+1
On early releases there were comments about implementing events on crafting and gathering to make that activities more interactive (so player needs to react to something) instead of being the result of a single/double click and waiting some time. Can we expect things that kind of interactivity so the tedium is reduced? If not, why? Any alternatives provided?
+1!
(Specifically R13: ‘Crafting will now have events that occur during the crafting process that the player can interact with to influence the results’ [more than ‘just’ hitting a critical and deciding to add fuel])
Agree. Some time ago I asked a similar question but about including “minigames”, but seems it is not planed for this episode. I hope devs will reconsider that.
Chris, quoting you…
“Combos are easy peasy to add any time. My goal is to always add a dozen a release to make sure everyone always has new challenges to take on but until the VFX and animators catch up, I’m holding off on putting more in.”
Combos are my favourite feature of the combat system, can you give us some examples of the combos to come?
I’d also like to know if there is something interesting coming up regarding skill stacking and combos in a not-so-distant future.
+1
Since the news about final wipe and lot selection (meh), and the new focus on getting the game out quickly (yay), can you please stop wasting time toward ANY request from ANYONE not strictly related to the july 28th goal and planned schedule, including, but not limited to:
– fluff
– decorations
– emotes
– add-ons assets
– anything that benefits the few, at expense of the many
– anything that will waste art & tech team time from now to august?
First meat, then smoke.
TIA.
I would like to make sure it’s understood that a request like this, though fair, is actually an example of someone making a request that “benefits the few over the many”. We all have different playing styles and one person’s “smoke” is another person’s “meat”. For example, what if someone that only cared about PVP said, “can we stop doing all this single player stuff please?”
Not trying to argue, just to give perspective.
+1
imop make the game fun then add the fluff.
+1
Sure, I hear you.
Tell me… How many people will benefit from City walls? By the Lot selection schedule and housing store, I can count 293 + 44 – out of around 59’000 backers (without Steam). Smoke.
Tell me… How many people will benefit from anything related to POT owners’ needs? Last time I counted, there were ~250 POTs. Again, out of 59K backers. Smoke.
How many people will have their game impacted by a decent combat system? By compelling quest mechanics? By exciting progression and impactful, meaningful consequences to one’s actions? By alternatives to grinding and having everything tied to adventurer level? Meat.
Thank you for your perspective. I stand by my request.
Katrina, I hope the devs address your question in its entirety. Because my guess is that the devs are not making “fluff” just because one or a group of people asked for it. My guess is that their schedule includes adding periodic assets to the add-on store in an effort to help fund the game.
However, the fact that people do ask for these things is probably very helpful to the developers because it gives them ideas of what people might actually buy if they shave off a few hours for an artist or an animator to develop that content. It’s also been my observation that the developers have tried to leverage these assets so that they can be craftable in-game or used in the main story line or as a prop for an NPC.
I’d like to see what the developers say to your question because my guess is that it’s not going to speed up the game development in a meaningful way, it will slow funding, and it will make the people that enjoy that type of thing less happy in the process.
But we’ll see. It should be an interesting response.
+1
that was for karinas post.. she has valid points i get the game needs to be funded but once that is achieved id love to see it go away.
Katrina,
I don’t agree with the way you’re framing this.
If POTs are just cookie-cutter housing blocks, its only then that they only benefit the POT owners and residents who live there. The residents will go there and use their houses for their own purposes, whether its for storage or personal role-playing. The common player, however, will have no reason to visit them, even though they clutter up certain areas of the map. They’ll just be places on the map to avoid and pass over.
On the other hand, if POTs are nice spaces to visit, they’ll benefit the community at large and enrich the game.
So, in my view, the way to make POTs serve the entire community is to give POT owners the tools to make them enjoyable, unique scenes. “POT owners vs. the community” is a false way of seeing the issue IMO.
On the other hand, I don’t have a problem with the general gist of what you’re saying is that there should be priorities for the devs and they should take care of core systems first.
Not sure they could do any less on single player.
+1 for focus in the basics.
+1
Katrina,
I hope that the devs start accepting asset submissions again. That way players can create a lot of decoration both for their own benefit and for the story portion of the game, and it will enrich the game world without putting a large burden on the art team. I know there are a lot of players who are waiting to help the devs out here (@Bowen Bloodgood).
Aside from that, there are probably a lot of assets that will be of use to them to create for story purposes, and then they can pass those on to players to use.
+1
If I could choose, I’d prefer for city walls to be done by player volunteers, and Port’s art team working on stuff used by The Rest Of Us(tm). Like some varied NPC models. Or you like the idea that every public/player vendor is the same everywhere, and identical to Siranto, to Kardan, to mr. Graff, to the mayor of Kingsport, and to a godzillion other characters, BUT BDF can then have his new necromantic emotes?
I mean, seriously?
+1
Question: could you offer some additional prosperity tools in the Add-Ons store?
Like chisels, needle, or molds?
Question for POT NPCs: when do we get updates?
Currently the pet vendor is worthless (only 2 recipes), the combat vendor has almost nothing.
What is the plan for the home vendor? I assume lot deeds will be severly limited in the future.
Question regarding the random number generator:
I have the feeling that the chances for gathering are not properly listed.
a) I had fails even with 100%.
b) after a fail another fail is way more likely. Once had 18 fails in a row for 53% success (the chance for this is something like 1:1.000.000). On avarage I think the chances seem to be correct.
Feedback on weather/night: I really enjoy the rain (visuals and especially the sound), makes me happy to sit in the dry myself
And the night is really dark, makes the sky visible and enforces use of torches/spells
Question: Will the remaining NPC locations to be placed in game have increased focus on town and city lots?
Reason (For Offline Reading by Port):
———————-
Looking at the current number of lots in primary NPC locations
-VS-
The number of Royal Founders at the TOPMOST tier (The earliest placers of each lot type)
AND
Excluding other influencing factors such as second lot deeds and POTs
———————-
We get these figures:
CITY vs ROYAL FOUNDER BARON
Lots Available in Primary NPC Locations = 18
Number of Pledges in the highest RF Tier at this level = 71
% Chance of owning a lot in a Primary NPC Location =25%
TOWN vs ROYAL FOUNDER LORD & MARSHALL
Lots Available in Primary NPC Locations = 51
Number of Pledges in the highest RF Tier at this level = 292
% Chance of owning a lot in a Primary NPC Location = 17%
VILLAGE vs KNIGHT & MARSHALL
Lots Available in Primary NPC Locations = 570
Number of Pledges in the highest RF Tier at this level = 517
% Chance of owning a lot in a Primary NPC Location = 110%
As you can see, the percent chance for those with a village deed are far greater than those with a town or city deed. This worries me.
This part somehow got erased when I posted:
Knight Marshalls are actually Town deed holders, however I had to count them as village deed holders, as the groupings didn’t allow me to make a clear distinction between the two. However, if you were able to take them out, the percent chance at Village level rises even greater.
Also, I made a miscalculation at Village level.
Correction:
VILLAGE vs KNIGHT & MARSHALL
Lots Available in Primary NPC Locations = 301
Number of Pledges in the highest RF Tier at this level = 517
% Chance of owning a lot in a Primary NPC Location = 58%
Apologies, I would like to change the focus of my question:
Question: What is Portalarium’s planned strategy for placing the remaining required lots into the game?)
Reason (For offline reading, copied from my forum post):
Excluding LotM and Duke:
From the placement plan, Village, Town & City Lots required = 5,964
Add on the 30%, Lots Required = 7,753
Minus the 639 NPC Location Lots currently in game = 7,114
So without the data for the rest of the NPC locations still to go in game, lets say the remaining lots have to go into PRTs:
There are currently 42 Lots in a “Holtrot”
Divide the 7,114 outstanding required lots into “Holtrots”, means a whopping 169 would need to be placed on the Overland Map
Add in the POTs, and that to me seems like its going to be a highly dense map. So given this, my interests are:
Are you planning on 169 “Holtrots”?
Are you planning some larger “Holtrots” maybe?
What is the scale and availability likely to be like in remaining NPC locations such as Brittany?
Are they going to address, that the current % chance that a City or Town deed owner will be able to snag an NPC location, is significantly lower than those with a village lot deed?
Thanks for your time.
Thanks for response. I was happy with the answer.
Question: the game feels like a ghost town most the time when i play, when will the mmo part come online?
months ago on the fourms i was told they have the zones are locked down as to not show many other people, i hope this changes because i feel like im playing a single player game when i play.
thanks
Question: Out of curiosity how many avatars completed all of the seventeen grand tours?
I would also love to know this.
Will likely only be answerable after next release begins, but I’d love a report on how many of each were granted along with how many Avatars have a complete set.
Concerning player vendors, could we have an options menu that would allow us to change the NPC type (male, female, race, etc) to replace the generic NPC that is associated with player vendors? This would give more variety to player vendors such that they all won’t look identical. Even NPC types that presently exist in game would be fine.
Ideally, I’d love to see all vendors customizable in the same manner as player characters, and have a “Paper Doll” allowing the owner to dress them as desired.
Question: Rather than ‘pre-position’ Vendors in their various shops for Player Owned Towns, could they remain independent and placeable separately?
Building and NPC limits would remain, but provide Governors with more flexibility. This should also remove work from the backlog rather than adding anything.
Could Public Vendors be added as placeable NPCs for Player Owned Towns?
This would provide local sales support for crafters that don’t have or don’t wish to purchase their own vendor.
@Womby started a good thread some time ago about making lots work as public lots. The idea was to provide a tax-break with some trade-offs. I don’t remember the whole idea, but one of the trade-offs would be making all containers publicly accessible. A similar one would be all vendors on those lots would have to be turned into public vendors.
Whether or not Womby’s idea comes true, that’s basically what public vendors are, isn’t it? Vendors with open permissions to everyone? So there would basically just need to be some sort of way to place vendors with open permissions. I imagine they’d either be outside any lot or on some public lot, if that idea comes in.
QUESTION what release is is dragging a pile of gold into a chest or dropping one on the floor?
Question:
Are there any thoughts on replayability for episode one? I know the dev team will continue to develop the game, but for example:
I’m max level and I have all the skills I want and I’m looking for something challenging to do. Maybe an instance that takes a group and alot of strategy to defeat? The experience is massive and at max level adds into an alternate advancement pool that I can spend in future releases of the game on new skills ect?
With Brewing coming and Agriculture already here, I have a
Question:
When we place a Windmill, can it have a function to grind our grain (wheat, corn, barley, etc.) into flour?
A Mill Village Size Home, placeable on a Village Water Lot would also be cool, assuming it could function as a mill.
With a social wipe before launch, what, if any, measure will be taken to prevent name-jacking and guild-jacking. I know many guilds and individuals have already created a name for themselves in game and have set up websites/etc outside of game to support their activities. Will there be anything to stop someone from taking their guild name/ character name at launch?
+1
+1
+1
+1
+1
+1 from me too.
+1 This is extremely important to many players and guilds.
+1
+1
+1
+1
Amazed at how much stuff you guys fit into each patch. Having fun with the combat system and also discovering the new bonuses that crafting materials provide!
Question: Any thoughts about enabling a bartering system on player vendors? eg: if I’m selling 100 iron ingots on my vendor, players can purchase these ingots for gold, but I can also define other resources or items that can satisfy the order?
Would you be able to get rid of the prompt to check if we want to water the plant?
Questions for the hangout:
1) Will you consider changing the interior layout of the Village size Obsidian Tower
2) Can we please have a row lot without a house on it?
3) Now that mules probably aren’t going to happen, will you implement any other way for us to carry a reasonable load of raw materials etc. for our crafting ? I would imagine in a real new brittannia there’d be cartwheel transports from logging stations to the craftsmen.
4) Can you offer us creative access with more unity packs, now that you’ve already proven you can have us pick trees?
5) I’m no POT owner, but I would like to know if they can change where roads go now or before R32.
6) Not really a question, but please remember to hire more support staff before you get to R32. We’re already waiting weeks for a reply from support. One FireLotus just isn’t enough I think.
I forgot another question:
7) How does having multiple characters work with regards to naming? Are you forced to have a family name attached to your character, or can mine simply be Neiro as it is now – and still work with the family rep sharing etc.
Don’t think “family”, but unique Avatars of you.
-1 for family name.. i know its RG’S wish but i would like multiple persona. i suppose ill just have to be happy with multuple accounts.
Q: Will the zone command be disabled when the transportation item is ingame?
Q: And a follow up question, what restrictions or rules will be placed on the transportation item?
Q: Can purchase orders be expanded to include barter not just straight gold transactions?
Could our virtues possibly influence our equipment (/skills), similar to item affiliation, like the ‘Blade of the Avatar’ in the ‘Blade of the Avatar’ Novel?
You’ve stated that all but one stretch goals would be implemented in later episodes. Are we going to see Elves in a future episode?
Question: Can you talk about your plans for poison in the future? Will there be multiple types of poison for the Poison Weapon skill? Will using poison affect virtue in some way?
Question: Will we be able to trap storage chests similar to UO? explosive and poison traps? and the ability to disarm them?
Question – The functionality of the smelting station is very nice. You’re able to pan the camera around, interact with storage chests etc, will this be the norm for other crafting stations?
Can the Cinereous Stone 2-Tier Outdoor Pedestal Fountain and the Isabelline Stone 2-Tier Outdoor Fountain be made “Indoor/Outdoor”, for decorative purposes? I’d like to place mine inside my home.
+1
Question – When will food buffs begin to have different stats? (Everything currently has +1 Health Regen)
Question – When will we see recipes for Tungsten and Zinc? (These have been torturing us forever!)
Question: When will there be enough keep lots in the game so those who qualify them can try them out?
Question:
What percentage of the storyline is actually in game right now? I feel like a lot of the zones are empty or have the same exact enemies in them and there is no purpose other than exploration purposes to visit them. Obviously the game is still pre launch how much more is planned to go into these zones?
Is there a plan to expand on the 30 enemies that are currently in the game to a broader number?
I made a thread since this hangout is supposed to be focused on storyline and quests….I don’t usually go to these since I work during those hours. I will leave the thread up as well.
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/single-player-story-hangout-questions.45260/#post-501299
1) Will towns be adjusted to make them feel less empty?
2) The world map at the moment feels lifeless and underutilized…is there plans to add some details and animations to fix this?
3)Quests at the moment consist of mostly fedex quests, they don’t have a very “ultima” feel, what is planned to fix this?
4) Is there a plan to increase the NPC’s to make areas feel full, knowing this is a issue with performance is there perhaps a slider to add more depending on machines?
5) Animations need a lot of work, is this planned before release?(Single player concern)
6) Why can’t characters sleep?
7) Is there budgetary concerns that have caused the push back of features until after soft launch?
8) Why is “Story & offline issues are only NOW getting strong attention.-RG” this only now starting to get attention when we have been told that all along it was being worked on?
+1
Single Player Question: As a POT owner, will I be able to turn off single player online mode in my POT?
So, I’m going to say this here. You can’t have a hangout dedicated to single player and storyline and not tell anyone other then a in a thread where certain backers got locked. No one is going to know about this. No one is going to see the questions here and it won’t do anything. In two plus years this is the first time you have done a hangout about this and no one will know.
Question: Do you have a schedule for the following towns to appear?
NW: Harvest, Estgard, Goti, Point West, Mud, and Noreach
NE: Port Graff, Spite, Brookside, Estmarch, and Broochash
Question: Could we get some details on the plan Richard Garriott was talking about regarding housing everyone that he spoke of in the Telethon?
Q: @Chris Can you give us some tidbits of some of the changes that are coming in March for gathering resources and creature loot to make it more fun and interesting?
Thanks much,
Ice Queen
From the Q1 2016 Schedule Update
Polish and balance passes will be made on resources, recipes, and creature loot.
Q: Are there plans for getting for-hire vendors in the game, so pledge vendors aren’t the only ones available?
Q: How will that work? Would you “buy” vendors from a merchant?
Q: Are there any thoughts on vendor naming? Would you need to interact with them to know their names? Or will vendors forever be able to advertise things like “BUY CHEAP WEAPONS HERE” in their nameplates?
Q: What about if vendors to be hired required a bed in a house, where — if whenever schedules were implemented — they would go to sleep?
Q: Will the story use random encounters in any way, or is it only being done through set locations?
Q: Will the story use roving encounters, like the gypsy wagon we saw at Kickstarter?
Q: Will fast travel cause problems with story elements like contraband quests? If someone can /zone to a destination during a such a quest, wouldn’t he be able to cheat and avoid players or NPCs looking for him?
Q: A goal for the game was for it to be playable with minimal UI elements, including with the nameplates turned off. How does the “conning” system square with that?
Q: Will weather in the game become regional and vary based on location and biome?
Q: Will local weather occurrences show up on the map as cues to players?
Q: How much will weather vary with the seasons?
Q: If a group of people (town/guild/etc) buys a taxable city/town lot, and the group has access to multiple royal scepters, can that lot’s tax rate for the month be reduced more than one time by different scepters?
Question: Do you have plans to make PRTs more attractive places to live?
They could all use the same template, but they need a central town market with generic NPC vendors and bank, and convenient layout for town, village and row (!) lots, and a variety of biomes.
Would be interesting to know, as many player may end up living in one of those places.
+1
1.Scimitars!!! Still waiting! when will we get them
2. Can we please get auto attack back for PVP (understanding the physical attacks are not as powerful as if we are not in auto) I really hate having to hit “t” just to go into auto attack especially when the setting i chose is auto attack! Dont give me options if i cant use them!
3. I still want a Log Cabin type house! (although the town keep and villiage tower are awesome!)
4. Being able to pick a class/weapon/spells/and skills at beginning would be nice!
5. Why are the so many items and resources to gather for simple crap to craft (all that did was remind me how much i hate crafting!!!!)
thats all i could think of for now!
+1
Q: Will there be a secure way to do the following without the danger of the lot being taken by a third party in the split second of the transfer/switch?
1. transfer claimed lots between players/accounts
2. switch the deed on a lot that one has already claimed
SP Offline Question: I do not wish to see any Player Owned or Run towns in the Single Player Offline game. Can you confirm that they will not be there?
SP Offline Question: I do not wish to see any Player Housing in NPC lots. Can you confirm that they will Not be seen and what will be there in its place to prevent NPC towns from looking quite vacant?
SP Offline Question: Can you clarify if Lord British or Darkstarr characters will ever be seen in the SP Offline story?
SP Online Question: Will it be possible to hide POTs and PRTs from the SP Online play through as they are not required?
SP Online and MultiPlayer Co-Op mode Question: Can we get an option to turn off decorations as there are so many decorations I don’t feel that performance can be enhanced to a point they do not impact gameplay.
SP Online and MultiPlayer Co-Op mode Question: Will there be a game mechanic to ensure too much intentional damage to the game’s economy cannot be done by Guild/POT pushes?
SP Online Question: Can you confirm that in Single Player Online, a player may move freely in any game scene, POT included, to help prevent possible movement griefing issues in MultiPlayer Co-Op mode?
A general comment to the devs about the answers given in this hangout.
With less than six months to go, there is no time left for equivocation. Please give clear and detailed information (spoilers excepted) and no speculation.
Specifically, please focus on the actual detailed plans that will end our constant wondering about lot availability and the single player game in response to questions already presented here and forum discussion.
If this hangout revolves around simple deco item speculation or any other such “fluff”, that in itself will be an answer about the state of the game.
A specific question. Darkstarr mentioned in final wipe functionality that there will be 40+ towns. That is not much more than in game currently and certainly not enough to accommodate all the pledge deeds, so what is the SPECIFIC plan (not a promise) to ensure that there will be enough lots to cover all the deeds + 30% as promised.
+1
why would you want to place ur property in somone elses pot, they could kick you out any time they wish. the game has to many towns as it is but im for more npc towns and less player owned towns. also id like to see on map whats npc and whats pc. also ive been toggled pvp for a week now and ive not seen one pvp encounter. can we please get map noticiations of where pvp people are located?
Aye, knowing exactly what the strategy would be nice. They have a way to roll out more places as needed. We know it’s gotta be PRT’s.
Things like……Where will they be located, on the map? Nested in the cities by having some sort of item to click much like the wagons for POTS? Will the PRT’s be POT sized? Will they have different biomes? Or will they be the dull foresty scenes we have atm like the Holtrot PRT’s? More details of what strategy and variety are for housing everyone would be great.
Q: Since a gate/recall mechanic is being introduced how do you plan to keep the seperate economic areas since goods can easily move from one to another. Maybe limit the amount of weight a person can carry through the gate (maxweight *.X).
Q: Will PVP players be able to pull other PVP players into a scene from the world map. This would be a free roving encounter.
Q: Are you planning world map events that affect the underlying hexes. Example a fog of obsidian shard particles (covering a few hexs) that increase resource spawn but also make it pvp/more dangerous.
Q: Is global illumination going to be turned on? Is it already?
Q: When will you do third pass on the tree curtains? They are used often and still look janky at close range.
The majority of people on the forums have stated that the NPC towns in game are not good enough, what is the possibility to get a decorating committee together to dress these places up?
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/npc-towns-what-makes-them-special.44357/
my issues are less decorations but there are to many of them for the land mass, and not enough npc towns. also we need a couple dangerous pvp npc towns.
Greetings
My Question Is: Are there any plans to add another type of one handed Pole Arm? I really want to craft a Trident!
2 Story and npc related questions:
————————————————–
————————————————–
**** Storyline quests – will you make an effort to make it so that players at least will know what the next step in the story quest is for them? (I get way lost real early on from Solace Bridge for example with no active quest in my quest journal)
**** Npc dialogue – do you have plans to revamp the npc dialogue? Perhaps have the doubliclicked npc dialogue in a separate centered window for maximum “feel” and story/character immersion.
(Having dialogue in the chat window is not nice. I made a thread with a bit more detailed suggestions. Feel free to pm me if you want.)
2 lot selection questions:
————————————
————————————
**** Will there be NPC town lots for all that wants one? To be clear I mean NOT PRT lots.
**** Will all the Dukes and LoTMs have a place in a NPC town if they want it for their keeps and castles?
Will there be another LotM and Duke VIP round table to coincide with Easter this year?
+1
+1 (or even any more at all)
Wondering if a full fledged Tutorial is planned for new players in the isle of storms?
Q: When will “idle behaviors” be available for NPCs?
Is it currently a design goal to add Crafting stations, NPC trainers, and Crafting supply NPC’s to Player Run Towns, prior to July 28th, 2016?
Is the housing selection system, whereby higher tier pledges can select lower tier lots, currently working as intended, for the Land Rush scheduled to start July 28th, 2016?
Since they are focusing on storyline today, I feel it is important to ask some questions about lore. There is not a lot of background information for the game, even at this late stage, and I’d really like to hear more about what the locals of Novia should be able to tell us easily.
Q: What are the other Words of Power, and when we will start to see them implemented? You told us Reno, Motus, and Zephyr back in the R19 Postmortem, but nothing has been mentioned since.
Q: How well known are the main characters? By that I mean, Lord British, DarkStarr, Arabella, Edvard the Bard, others that may be stand-ins for developers or other “important people”. This seems to fluxuate, as with Lord British it ranges from the “Yet today, many no longer know of him…” on the Steam card, to him being well known enough as a historical figure that “Rumours say that Dysborg was once a great city of valiant fighters loyal to Lord British and his ancient Virtues.” Others, like the Titans, have been said to no longer exist (in Update #158), but in-game Grannus is still noted as the King of Norguard. Also, can you reveal which characters are the persona of any of the devs or friends?
Q: In Ultima, each city had a focus. Trinsic was the city of Honor, etc. What are the city purposes of New Britannia, and why do NPCs go there? Looking at many of them in-game, its difficult to understand why someone would go to Celestis instead of Soltown, or Highvale instead of Britanny. Do they have histories written that just are not in-game? What will be in the manual about these places?
Q: Who are the Cabalists, and what are known (or rumored) about them?
Thanks for making a great game, and I hope to see it grow ever more “Ultimate RPG” like!
I’d like to know more about the Cabalists too and the events.
Q1 2016 schedule
Creatures: At least one Cabalist will begin wreaking havoc on besieged towns.
Can we have bugs bounty system? When bugs that are investigated via user are rewarded vua small amount of money to account balance? $5-10 e.g. (or reward can be ingame items)
Will PRT’s (Player Run Towns) get Crafting NPC’s, Crafting Supply NPC’s and Crafting Stations prior to the land rush?
Question: Can player owned towns get the option to drop things like compass markers for custom “areas” of the city to be discovered ?
Question: When will /stick operate on the overworld map just move you a little or to your last exit (as it used to be) again rather than a fixed point?
Follow up question to the last one: How in the blue blazes did port phoenix wind up as the /stuck go to point? Get these kids off mah lawn!
One thing that can help ramp up sales is word of mouth. In last 2013 through the end of 2014, the Recruit-A-Friend program allowed backers to increase their own pledge by having their friends join SotA. That wouldn’t work now, but I think we do need to have incentives to bring in more backers.
Would you consider a new Refer-A-Friend program that earns players either bonus in-game rewards (a new, different emote; special pets; decorative items, etc), or a small bounty ($5 Add-On Store Credit) when you get new users to sign up, either through the website or Steam? This is especially nice if both the referrer and referee receive the benefit, and when it is advertised up front when signing up. This helps grow the community by getting new backers to at least contact one other person prior to pledging.
Question – for the love of the titans can we please raise deco limits for towns in general? And also, possibly make the stage, stage stairs and bleachers placable in the player owned town? They WERE the first deco ever to be put in a POT (PaxLair)
My Avatar has a very expensive curing salt habit… its rather debilitating. He grinds all day for gold to buy curing salt. Can I get some government subsidy?