Avatar’s Update #266: The Making of South Midmaer Way and South Fetid Swamp, and New Bears!

Greetings Fellow Avatars! Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

Game Development

News Announcements

Community Updates

The Making of South Midmaer Way

South Midmaer Way used to be the location of a thriving city with lovely canals on the shore of a large lake in an otherwise arid region. The city grew rich on trade through the area as it sat astride the main road. The rulers of the city built tombs to themselves amongst the cliffs and hid their treasures in them, defended by traps of course! However the lake dried up and the town was abandoned. Now opportunistic Satyrs have set up a bazaar in the ruins and Plunderers raid the tombs.

[From a A Dev+ Forum Post by Chris “Sea Wolf” Wolf]

Hey folks, I have a few screenshots to share of our updates to South Midmaer Way. The visuals are inspired by African grasslands like the Kalahari, as well as the ruins and rough terrain of the Valley of The Kings. A Satyr bazaar lies at the heart of the grasslands, nestled within the canals of an ancient city. In the mountainous ravines, plunderers and Satyrs alike are raiding the tombs of ancient kings which are scattered throughout the map.

Satyr Bazaar

The Grasslands

The Plunderers’ Airship

The Tomb of the Child King

Chris Wolf
Level Designer

The Making of South Fetid Swamp

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Esteben “SorcerousSteve” Zaldivar]

Hey guys, SorcerousSteve here to give you the latest on my newest map: South Fetid Swamp!

Located on the western end of Verdantis it is the site of an ancient siege now littered with pungent skeletons, battered siege machines, and moss covered encampments. Methane is known to come out of the bog from time to time and produce small fires on the surface of the water.

The Ancient Siege of Castle Irvine

After a prolonged siege the attacking forces, consisting of elves, assaulted the South side of the castle. Waves of boats crossed the swamp but upon landing on shore they were met with unrelenting arrow fire. Few managed to get ashore and those that did then had to scale the mud cliffs. The slippery damp mud made utilizing ladders and ropes difficult. Casualties mounted but a brave few managed to break inside the castle courtyard…

A mysterious mudhouse dwelling deep within the fetid swamp.

Many of the swamp locals like to keep to themselves in this neck of the woods.

Inside of the mysterious mudhouse dwelling.

Looking down the heavily forested swamp littered with cypress knees, fish can be seen through the green water.

Stay tuned for another update on South Fetid Swamp!

New Bears to Roam New Britannia

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Starr “Darkstarr” Long]

We originally purchased our bears from the Unity Asset store to save time and money, but they were not visually competitive. To address this shortcoming Kevin @UglyFist Wells completely rebuilt the bears for Release 51 including all the variations, the bear headdresses, bear mask, and the bear clan barbarians. 

Brown Bear:

Grizzly Bear

Polar Bear:

Patriarch Bear:

Obsidian Bear:

Vendor Variations & Improvements

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Starr “Darkstarr” Long]

In Release 51 we will begin improving Player Vendors through a series of technical and visual improvements. The first thing we will try to improve is visual variation. Long term we plan to support customization of vendors via equipment choice but for now we are focusing on providing that visual variation through our pattern system.

These patterns will include a female version of the current vendor, a completely new outfit based on Victorian shopkeeper uniforms (with gender and skin tone variations), and a cash register that will act as a fully functioning player vendor (even though it does not appear as an NPC).

We are also moving player vendors to actual NPCs with AI behaviors (vs just being interfaces) so that they can animate, sit down, etc. (instead of being statues that are just interfaces). This will allow us to do things like have vendors who don’t have inventory or haven’t had any sales in a long time sit down as an example. This is part of a much larger (and VERY cool) tech task where npcs on lots and towns can now act independently of their owner. This is going to allow us to finally have pets move and behave when the owners isn’t around instead of just being statues.

Finally we are also adding a new date column to the vendor UI so you can sort by the latest item added. This is just the first of many interface improvements that will be coming. Later we plan to do some major improvements to permissions and controls in vendors.

As part of all this we will be posting here some shots of these visual improvements as they are completed.

Merchant Cash Register & Pattern: This is a simple in-game commision charging version and will be available for purchase in-game in the same locations you can purchase in-game vendors now. You can also purchase the pattern to apply to any existing vendor (commision or commision free).

Ornate Cash Register & Pattern: This is an ornate commision charging version and will be available for purchase in the Add On Store. You can also purchase the pattern to apply to any existing vendor (commision or commision free).

Bundle Cash Register Pattern: This is a pattern that comes with bundles. Note that pledges that came with vendors will also receive one of these patterns. 

The Making of The Lost Vale (cont.)

“The Lost Vale” is a new adventure area (originally promised during the Kickstarter campaign) that is accessible only during special astronomical alignments. Note this is not to be confused with the Hidden Vale which is an entire island of both adventuring areas and towns that is accessible at all times.

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Travis “Vas Corp Por” Koleski]

Heraldry Items (cont.)

This week we iterated further on the armor to ensure that the Founder versions were visually distinct and the Founder Cloth Heraldry Armor is making it’s first appearance.

[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Starr “Darkstarr” Long]

UPDATE Feb 8: Founder heraldry items will have unique visuals including collars on the tabards, longer bottom cloth sections with angled designs, shinier cloth, thicker/more detailed edging, and other details. We have updated the pictures in the post and the Sketchfab links with these updated visuals as well as adding the latest version of the Founder Cloth Armor.

Founder Cloth Heraldry Armor

Founder Leather Heraldry Armor

Founder Plate Heraldry Armor 

Founder Chain Heraldry Armor 

R50 Postmortem Telethon YouTube Video & Missed Questions

YouTube: We got the video of the Postmortem posted to youtube for those of you who missed it (our apologies for the first few minutes being cut off due to technical difficulties).

Missed Questions: We had over 10 pages of questions left unanswered after the R50 Postmortem! With assistance from the team we were able to get to those questions and we posted them to the forums Thursday.

[From a Forum Post by Starr “Darkstarr” Long]

Here are the questions that we did not have time to get to during the R50 Postmortem. I tried my best to answer these (with help from the rest of the team) but some we just don’t have details yet to provide. I probably won’t have time to do any follow ups to these. The community did a great job assisting us this telethon to make sure we didn’t miss a single question.

Please note I deleted a bunch of duplicated questions and also deleted any questions that we answered with the Q1 post or with the release of R50 or that we answered in previous postmortems. Also note that we are generally going to stop answering questions about “when?” as those are answered by our quarterly schedule posts and any other answers are going to be either “No ETA” or “soon” or “will update with the next quarterly post”.

A final thought: we see a LOT of repeat questions and requests. Please consider reading one of the other missed question posts, watching one of the previous post mortems, reading one of the post mortem transcripts, and/or reading our Post Episode 1 plan post before posting a question. Your question might have already been answered.

Elgarion: Can you please explain how looting/pickpocketing players works now? Especially in regards to a large stack of items–let’s say the person has a single piece of ore next to a stack of 500 ore in their inventory.
Atos: Choosing ransomed items now only includes the first item of a type in its list of choices. So having 200 unstacked worms only counts once. We didn’t get in the stack splitting but it does favor medium size stacks of stuff over giant ones. It can still pick a giant one but just less likely. I don’t think we are going to reveal the exact math but feel free to go experiment with a friend and see what you think!

Uncle Sven: What other reflex / twitch combat features do you intend to implement?
Atos: I plan on continuing to add more 2-3 second window situational or response skills BUT as with past skills, I try to make this optional. While I like to reward people who do like that aspect I don’t want to make it so powerful that it is required to be competitive. I have hooks for checking time since you criticaled hit or were critically hit, since you block/parry/dodge or were block/parry/dodged, and plan to more options of that sort over time. For the most part between now and launch my focus will be on Masteries (now calling them proficiencies), a small number of new skills, combos, and balance.

Xee: Can we have the ability to place things on castle walls and in the castle wall towers?
Starr: We have done some experiments with this but there are some serious visual issues. The main issue is that walls and fences have very “soft” collision to make them easier to place partially inside of each other to make perimeter fencing easier. Unfortunately this means items placed “on” them will appear partially “inside” the walls/fences. We don’t have an easy way to fix this without creating two separate collision layers which would be performance expensive. With that said we do want to make this happen eventually.

Mia Sway: after geming weapons and getting “on hit” then geming ring and necklace to do more damage, Does adding that gem to your chest add anything ? if not should it ?
Starr: Yes there are lots of gem enchantments tied to the chestpiece.
BCotton: Armor procs are unique to chest armor and require them to be gemmed. Chest armor has enchantments just like all other slots.

Seferfantasy: Will the taming system be adjusted anytime soon?
Atos: My belief is the concerns with the taming system are largely caused by people comparing it to the UO system and the power it gave. The difference is in UO, you had to give up a LOT of other skills to be a master tamer. In games like WoW or EQ, the classes are designed around whether they have a pet or not so they can make the pet more powerful. In SOTA, we let you learn any and all skills so if we made pets powerful, they would be essentially mandatory for play and players wouldn’t have to give up anything for them. We tried to balance this through focus costs and consumables but still didn’t get to a point where old tamers were happy. I will be introducing a new proficiency system (I was calling it masteries) and it will finally bring choice and also more power to tamers. It will go live in R51.

Alley Oop: what’s the demonym for residents of the hidden vale?
Starr: Good question. Hidden Valley Ranchers?

[Read More…]

NPC Submission Requests: Xenos & Yew

Scott “Lum” Jennings posted our latest request for NPC submissions for Yew and Xenos. This is for Developer+ level backers who are eligible for the “Design an NPC” reward “Help create and name a character in the game”.

For reference here is our current status on which towns we have done this work on and which towns remain to be done:

Done:

  • Aerie
  • Ardoris
  • Braemar (no backer NPCs)
  • Desolis
  • Estgard
  • Etceter
  • Jaanaford
  • Kiln
  • Kingsport (no backer NPCs)
  • Owl’s Head (no backer NPCs)
  • Resolute
  • Solania (no backer NPCs)
  • Soltown (no backer NPCs)
  • Spite

In progress:

  • Xenos
  • Yew

To be done:

  • Bramble
  • Brittany and suburbs
  • Broochash
  • Brookside
  • Celestis
  • Eastmarch
  • Elad’s Lighthouse
  • Fortus End
  • Goti
  • Graff Island
  • Mud
  • Noreach
  • Northwood
  • Point West
  • Port Graff
  • Storm’s Reach
  • Westend

XENOS:

Humility[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Scott “Lum” Jennings]

Thank you for your continuing support of Shroud of the Avatar! This month, we’re seeking entries for inhabitants of the town of Xenos!

Port of entry to the mysterious island of Elysium, Xenos is a town where humans, elves and satyrs live in harmony… or so it seems. Dominated by a stream of pilgrims seeking entry to the legendary halls of Artifice, Xenos is a key waystation on the Path of Truth for every aspiring avatar. Even were that not so, however, its unique architecture and art make it popular among tourists of every stripe.

Note that Xenos is not the only town we will be seeking submissions from for R51. If you do NOT want your backer NPC to be in Xenos, you may want to wait. I will update this thread if we are running low on submissions – generally we are OK on duplicate submissions for characters who don’t get adopted (such as guards) but if you absolutely have a character who should be in a given city (such as Brittany) you should wait until we advertise for that city.

First, some brief notes:

  • Xenos is one of our “uncloning” scenes, where we go back and fill out unique content for each village and city. Thus, the NPCs are already in the game, but we can change appearance (to a degree, as seen below), gender, etc. to suit your request. If you want to pick a specific NPC (for example, one near your own house) we will do our best to accomodate you but may not be able to.
  • NPC visual customization, as you may have noticed, is still at a very early stage in development. Right now for the backers who want to be added to Xenos, we cannot offer any visual customization options beyond our standard gallery of NPC models. If you would like to have input over the visual customization of your NPC, you can wait for further releases when we can offer this. We will also allow a one-time visual re-customization once customization has been added if you would like to add your NPC now.
  • Response to this will be on a first-come first-served basis for each call for responses. If your NPC doesn’t appear in Xenos, feel free to respond again in future posts. We have quite a few towns and cities to populate (over 20, actually…)
  • We are allowing people who have already submitted NPCs to submit their ideas for Xenos as well if they like, but people who have not yet submitted an NPC will take priority over those who have.
  • When responding, please list a first and second choice for profession.
  • There are a few NPCs which already have been placed as part of the main quest (Capt. Steel, Kiakis, Notus) which will not be changed.
  • NPCs for Xenos can be human, satyr or elven.

Still with us? Great! Here’s what we need for Xenos (updated 8:45a Central, 1/30):

  • 10 9 guards (satyrs only)
  • 1 innkeeper
  • 1 waiter/waitress
  • 1 butcher
  • 1 textiles merchant
  • 1 food merchant
  • 1 crafting supplies merchant
  • 1 housing deeds merchant
  • 1 housing decorations merchant
  • 1 magic supplies merchant
  • 1 carpentry supplies merchant
  • 1 blacksmith
  • 1 weapons merchant
  • 1 fishing merchant
  • 3 fishermen
  • 1 combat trainer
  • 1 crafting trainer
  • 1 banker
  • 1 town crier
  • 1 public vendor
  • 1 guild registrar
  • 12 8 pilgrims (must be human, should be obsessed with despair, envy, greed or lust)

If you’d like to have your namesake be a resident of Xenos please respond via private message on this forum to me (Lum) using the following format:

  • NPC name:
  • NPC gender:
  • NPC race (human satyr or elven):
  • NPC profession (first choice):
  • NPC profession (second choice):
  • NPC background (optional): A paragraph on whom your NPC is, how they would respond to nosy outlanders poking about their business, what brings them to Xenos (or keeps them there), or anything else you’d like to add. We reserve the right to edit and/or reject any background that does not fit the lore and setting of the game.

Please specify in your submission that this NPC is for Xenos.

We will respond if: your NPC is used; if it is rejected for whatever reason (such as an inappropriate name); if a supplied background is inappropriate, or if your NPC missed the cutoff for this release.

Thanks for your support, and see you in Xenos!

YEW:

Humility[From a Dev+ Forum Post by Scott “Lum” Jennings]

Thank you for your continuing support of Shroud of the Avatar! This month, we’re seeking entries for inhabitants of the village of Yew!

Shrouded in mist, Yew is an example of the simple beauty that the surviving elves not consumed by the rage of Obsidians try to find in the world. Found in the forests of northern Paladis, Yew is far from the troubles that consume much of Novia – something that its residents find to their liking.

Note that Yew is not the only town we will be seeking submissions from for R51. If you do NOT want your backer NPC to be in Yew, you may want to wait. I will update this thread if we are running low on submissions – generally we are OK on duplicate submissions for characters who don’t get adopted (such as guards) but if you absolutely have a character who should be in a given city (such as Brittany) you should wait until we advertise for that city.

First, some brief notes:

  • Yew is one of our “uncloning” scenes, where we go back and fill out unique content for each village and city. Thus, the NPCs are already in the game, but we can change appearance (to a degree, as seen below), gender, etc. to suit your request. If you want to pick a specific NPC (for example, one near your own house) we will do our best to accomodate you but may not be able to.
  • NPC visual customization, as you may have noticed, is still at a very early stage in development. Right now for the backers who want to be added to Yew, we cannot offer any visual customization options beyond our standard gallery of NPC models. If you would like to have input over the visual customization of your NPC, you can wait for further releases when we can offer this. We will also allow a one-time visual re-customization once customization has been added if you would like to add your NPC now.
  • Response to this will be on a first-come first-served basis for each call for responses. If your NPC doesn’t appear in Yew, feel free to respond again in future posts. We have quite a few towns and cities to populate (over 20, actually…)
  • We are allowing people who have already submitted NPCs to submit their ideas for Yew as well if they like, but people who have not yet submitted an NPC will take priority over those who have.
  • When responding, please list a first and second choice for profession.
  • There are a few NPCs which already have been placed as part of sidequests (Cavillatus, Micsere the blacksmith, and Pendro the magic supplies merchant) which will not be changed.
  • NPCs for Yew can be human or elven.

Still with us? Great! Here’s what we need for Yew (updated 8:45A Central, 1/30)

  • 13 10 guards
  • 1 innkeeper
  • 1 waiter/waitress
  • 1 baker
  • 1 butcher
  • 1 farming supplies merchant
  • 2 1 fishing merchants/fishermen
  • 1 combat trainer
  • 1 crafting trainer
  • 1 banker
  • 1 town crier
  • 1 public vendor
  • 1 guild registrar
  • 8 3 residents/visitors
  • 3 children

If you’d like to have your namesake be a resident of Yew please respond via private message on this forum to me (Lum) using the following format:

  • NPC name:
  • NPC gender:
  • NPC race (human or elven):
  • NPC profession (first choice):
  • NPC profession (second choice):
  • NPC background (optional): A paragraph on whom your NPC is, how they would respond to nosy outlanders poking about their business, what brings them to Yew (or keeps them there), or anything else you’d like to add. We reserve the right to edit and/or reject any background that does not fit the lore and setting of the game.

Please specify in your submission that this NPC is for Yew.

We will respond if: your NPC is used; if it is rejected for whatever reason (such as an inappropriate name); if a supplied background is inappropriate, or if your NPC missed the cutoff for this release.

Thanks for your support, and see yew in Yew!

The Adventures of Lord British & Lars Janssen

Richard “Lord British” Garriott from our team at Portalarium, and Lars Janssen from Travian Games sat down with the Talk in der Alm guys to chat about the history of video games and the development of Shroud of the Avatar! Have a listen:

Free Trial: Choose Any Path!

With Release 50, Free Trial users can now choose any of the three paths (Truth, Love, or Courage) to start, but after selection are locked to that single path going forward. We changed this from locking them to a path that we had chosen (Courage) because we felt this misrepresented a core part of the brand of the game, which is “choice in all things” (ex. choosing your path, no classes, choose virtue/non-virtue, etc.).

Free Trial access allows you to play the entire game in any of the Online modes with a few key differences in game play. You will be able to explore hundreds of scenes, talk with thousands of players, adventure through the opening quests, and gain experience and skills as you get used to the world of New Britannia!

Here is the updated list of Visitor limits:

  • The term (Visitor) is appended to their character name
  • Max skill level set to 50
  • NEW! Limited to a single Story Path (Truth, Love or Courage)
  • Cannot purchase nor sell items via Player Vendors nor Public Vendors
  • No ownership of player property nor use of player property signs
  • Cannot move/interact with items on a player property (even if given permissions)
  • Cannot interact with public chests
  • Cannot give items to other players via Trade or Mail
  • Cannot flag as Open PVP
  • Cannot gain nor create ransom items when you kill or are killed in PVP (in Open PVP zones)
  • Character data may be deleted if not eventually upgraded to a paid account
  • Cannot play in Offline Mode

Join us in New Britannia for free today!

Weekend Flash Sale: Viking & Wolf Items

In honor of the new Norgard Barbarians Gear and new wolves that made it in the game in Release 50, we are putting all Viking and Wolf related items on sale this weekend!

Get a look at the lineup below. All of the sale items are available on the Add-On Store, and several are also available for sale on in-game Gold Crown Merchants (located in Ardoris, Central Brittany, Resolute, Aerie, and Owl’s Head):

Job Opening: Executive Assistant

Thank you for your interest in Portalarium! We currently have an opening in Austin, Texas for a full-time, Executive Assistant position, as described below. If you’d like to join the Portalarium Tribe, the team building the ground-breaking Shroud of the Avatar game, please submit your resume/cover letter to: jobs@portalarium.com

Job Summary:

Assisting founder/CEO with company and personal administrative tasks including: managing calendars, making travel plans, meeting and event arrangements, payment and filing of invoices, managing mail, preparation of reports, and errands. General office administration tasks include coordinating general office activities and operations, maintain stocks of office supplies, manage phone calls and general office correspondence (e-mail, letters, packages etc.), support budgeting and bookkeeping procedures, create and update records and databases with personnel, financial and other data, assist colleagues whenever necessary.

Responsibilities and Duties:

  • Assist founder/CEO with company and personal administrative tasks including: managing calendars, making travel plans, meeting and event arrangements, payment and filing of invoices, managing mail, preparation of reports, and errands.Coordinating general office activities and operations
  • Assist executive staff and colleagues whenever needed
  • Maintain stocks of office supplies
  • Manage phone calls and general office correspondence (e-mail, letters, packages etc.)
  • Support budgeting and bookkeeping procedures
  • Create and update records and databases with personnel, financial and other data

Qualifications and Skills:

  • Minimum 2 years experience as an executive assistant to a C-level executive
  • Has a professional writing style that represents Portalarium and CEO well
  • Able to follow creative/technical/business conversations
  • Ability to craft business correspondence, as well as ~750 word articles when provided general ideas to develop
  • When given research materials or a publicly available topic to research, will be able to conduct search and summarize key points on a topic efficiently.
  • Able to efficiently translate assigned tasks (verbal or written) into prioritized checklists/schedules and can effectively manage those checklists/schedules.
  • Is able to self-organize and self-prioritize when necessary
  • Expert Outlook Calendar management, able to clearly detail pertinent event information
  • High attention to detail
  • High adaptability & takes feedback well
  • Self-driven with high work ethics, able to stay focused on work-related tasks, seeks out tasks during down time.
  • High level of self-reliance
  • Willingness to tackle all kinds of tasks for any and all admin needs
  • Proficiency with Microsoft Windows environment and Microsoft Office (Excel, PowerPoint, Word), Adobe Acrobat, Docusign, etc.
  • OPTIONAL: Basic accounting including use of Quickbooks
  • OPTIONAL: Familiarity with Google Docs, Google Sheets, Dropbox, Slack, and JIRA

This position starts as a full-time contract position with potential transition to full-time employee within 6-12 months. Once the transition to employee occurs, then the employee position includes company paid medical, dental, and vision through United Healthcare.

Job Types: Full-time, Contract

Salary: $15.00 to $22.50 /hour

Upcoming Events Calendar

Feb 22, 2018 – Release 51
Mar 13, 2018 – SXSW Interactive: Overhead Transit: Cable, Hyperloop, PRT & Drones
Mar 14, 2018 – Launch Event at Bob Bullock Museum
Mar 15 – 17, 2018 – SXSW Gaming Expo Booth
Mar 15, 2018 – SXSW Interactive: $100,000 Blockchain Investment Challenge
Mar 15, 2018 – SXSW Gaming: It’s Here! Shroud of the Avatar and What’s Coming Next
Mar 17, 2018 – SXSW Gaming: The Ever-Evolving Nature of Game Crowdfunding
Mar 21 – 23, 2018 – GDC: Classic Game Postmortem: ‘Ultima Online’
Mar 27, 2018 – Release 52: Launch Candidate
April 26, 2018 – Release 53
May 31, 2018 – Release 54
June 28, 2018 – Release 55
July 26, 2018 – Release 56
Aug 21 – 25, 2018 – Gamescom
Aug 30, 2018 – Release 57

Visit the official Community Calendar to see the great lineup of activities our amazing community has planned for this weekend! And be sure to check out this month’s Release Events thread in the SotA forums for additional events.

The Magnificent Trophy Rooms Contest Returns!

Get your homes ready! You have the fun opportunity to show off your hunting heroism, crafting coordination, and trophy triumphs in this new three part contest.

Adding on to last year’s trophy room contest, we now have the wild boars and updated wolves to make into new trophies! Here’s how the contest will work…

PART 1: Hunt down a creature, defeat another player (to get their skull), or catch a fish!

PART 2: Craft the trophy from that creature (human skulls come as-is, no preparation needed…)

PART 3: Display your trophy triumphs in a single room of a house you have access to!​

Submissions Must Include:

  • 2-3 screens of combating a creature that can provide a trophy (1x with UI, 1x without)
  • 2-3 screens of you in the crafting process for creating the trophies (2x with UI)
  • 3 screens of your trophy room (1x with UI, 2x without UI, different angles, lighting, etc.)
  • Brief one paragraph description for each screenshot category. Please include as much basic detail about the location and other statistics that might be useful for others wanting to hunt the area to craft their own trophies.

Submit all screenshots in a single post response to This Forum Thread. Deadline to submit is Monday, Feb. 26 at 11:59pm CT.

[Read More…]

Virtue Marathon 2018: Children’s Miracle Hospital Network

Avatars, on your marks!

Join Lord British and the crew from Portalarium, AERIE Fund, and Meretz as we tackle the 5K, Half Marathon and Full Marathon to raise funds and awareness for the Children’s Miracle Network Hospital Network at the Austin Marathon 2018.​

This event is open to all community members, friends and families to attend and/or support!

Austin Marathon Event Info:
When: Sunday, February 18th
Where: Downtown Austin, TX

Although the deadline to participate as a member of Team Avatars has passed, you can still show your support by making a tax-deductible donation (via this page) to the CMHN. Every bit helps and will push Team Avatars to cross that finish line!! Donate $25 or more to the CMHN and receive a Virtue Marathon 2018 in-game digital cloak! (pictured above). No need to attend the event in Austin to redeem. ​

See the full forum post for details!

Sequanna Brasserie – Valentine’s Day Dinner – February 14 – 3-7pm CT

Sequanna Brasserie - Valentine's Day Dinner

Come join us for one night only – at Sequanna Brasserie in Ordinis Mortis for our Valentine’s Day Dinner.

Come alone or with your own special Valentine to enjoy a meal. Avatars Radio have graciously offered to cover the event. 3pm -7pm Central, February 14th.

Getting Started Videos: How to Learn New Emotes!

With the recent video creation contest collecting over 200 videos, we are now selecting a video from this collection to present in this weekly Getting Started Video Series feature!

This week we spotlight Lace’s ‘Emotes – How to Learn/Teach and Find Out Where to Get Them’ video!

For more walkthrough videos, subscribe to www.youtube.com/portalarium to get the latest releases!

Did You Know: The Forests of New Britannia are Fraught with Danger!

Avatars! This is Elgarion from @SotAHelp with a regular “Did You Know?” feature. Expect to see these posted regularly on community channels, and here in the weekly update!

Did you know the forest adventure scenes in @ShroudofAvatar are oft fraught with hidden dangers? Before harvesting wood with an axe, prepare yourself. Some trees let their dislike of woodland intruders abundantly clear—beware the Reaper!

Recommended Project to Support – The Saga of Lucimia MMORPG

It has been centuries since the Adepts and Elders roamed the land, wielding magic to protect humanity from what lies beyond. Mortals have learned how to get by with the strength of their own two hands. Have learned how to survive. How to adapt. But they cannot face the rising threat from across the seas alone. Only magic can defeat magic. And so their quest begins: a journey to rediscover the source of all magic, and harness it for the salvation of humanity.

The Saga of Lucimia is a group-based MMORPG developed by Stormhaven Studios, LLC. Originally designed as a homegrown tabletop campaign in the 90s, our focus is primarily on enhancing the tabletop experience and providing an old-school experience for MMORPG gamers who thrive on community-based adventures that span the course of weeks, months, and years alongside their fellow adventurers. Epic storylines, 8-person groups, multi-group raids, ability-based character progression, crafting that is equally important to adventuring, no mini maps, no experience points, zero quest hub grinding, no flashing icons over NPC heads telling you who to talk to, and an endless world to explore.

Robert “Undone” Thompson here from Portalarium! Saga of Lucimia is a hobby project of mine that also played a big role in my hiring. I have been the lead developer on it for the past few years and am very excited to share it with you. I hope you enjoy what you see from this passion project!

Resources – Players Helping Players

SotA_NewPlayerWelcome_Forum

The official SotA New Player Welcome Forum and the Player Created Resources Forum have the best player created resources for Shroud of the Avatar, whether it’s a Player Written Guide, a Video Walk-through, or a Wiki-type Website.

Visit the official Community Resources page for a complete listing of all things community.

Backer Shipping Addresses

SotA_ShippingAddressIn preparation for shipping backers’ physical pledge rewards around the game’s launch period, on your Account Page, please enter your shipping address, log in to the SotA website, select “Account” in top right corner, then select “Edit Profile” located in top left corner, beneath your Avatar image.

A reminder to be sure that support@portalarium.com is unblocked from your e-mail account!