PlaneShift

Announcements => PlaneShift News and Rules => Topic started by: Talad on May 11, 2014, 03:16:22 pm

Title: Setting update
Post by: Talad on May 11, 2014, 03:16:22 pm
(http://www.planeshift.it/element/%7B%22width%22%3A304%2C%22height%22%3A600%7D/Picture%20of%20the%20day/planeshift_333.jpg)

We have just released a quite large setting update! This update has been a long time in the planning, construction, production and testing. We must thank every Developer, Prospect, Contributor, and Player who helped us put this simply enormous collection of new work together.

Here is a list of all the changes.

Books
There are now 25 new books. This is an increase of over 25% over the previous amount so we now have more than 110. The books cover a range of topics from cultural information like marriages, greetings, and games to topics like Dark Way magic to selections of stories and diaries. These are spread out over the game world so good luck finding them all. We have also reorganised Jayose's library to try and better seperate the book topics, so you might need to spend some time finding where all the books are now.


Quests
We have released 20 new quests, which gives us more than 400 in total. These are some of the most 'advanced' quests so far written. Some are just plain silly, some fun, and some infuriating. These include much more interaction with the world, we will have players acting out breaking into a house through a window, poisoning barrels with glyphs, and cleaning dusty shelves. This is done via finding the right item and right clicking on it, exactly like you do when entering a house via the door. Due to the fact this is the first time we are being this adventurous with quests there will be the odd little bug, please let us know if you find one. The quests which use these have pointers in the quest notes to help you work out what you need to do. We also have a nice selection of quests which allow for gathering new crafting books such as those for mace crafting, heavy armour crafting, and Kran cooking.

We have now completed the quest chain re-work project. Most of the current quests have been fitted where suitable, and as well as we possibly could, into chains. We have also added dialogue to most quests so once one is completed you are pointed onto the next one or at least given hints to others in the chain. This is done by the NPC telling you and/or a comment in the quest notes. Quests in the 'main chain' are always pointed to. But not all individual side quests are. So there will be times when you will still stumble across new quests which you may not have done. We are doing this as there is no need to point to every quest, and if we did it would be like releasing a quest chain map, and we wanted to keep some things a surprise and tougher to find. If you did a quest after auto quest notes were added, the notes will automatically be updated. So if you've already done a quest, you might want to look in the notes to see what new information is stated to lead you to subsequent quests.

A long overdue change is that all glyph rewards have been reorganised such that there is a much greater variation of rewards. We can now tell you that every glyph (55 in total) is now set as a reward in at least two quests, this excludes those you can buy and excludes those in a quest which you can repeat. But be careful with some quests which rewards glyphs, if you don't do what you are asked you will not get the reward, but if you do, rewards for all. This re-organisation will make it MUCH MUCH easier for new and current players to get important spells, and glyphs. For example sleep and water, two important glyphs for early mages, are now obtained much early in their respective chains which in turn will make it easier to be a new mage. Because of these changes many of the quests with new glyph rewards will be 'reset' so that players can do them again. We have made some changes to the rewards to the magic circle quests but we HAVE NOT reset any of these, this is because it can be hard to find items to progress up the chain so did not want to force players to do this again. And as every glyph can be obtained else where no player will miss out on the chance to get every glyph. Oh, and there are 4 new glyphs, each with a spell(s) to get, one of these glyphs no one in game currently has.

Since we released the tutorial we were often asking for feed back and we have made lots of small changes. This includes lots of dialogue fixes and small menu changes, Krans now get Kran food from Abelia due to the skill release, and maps are given before entry into the main game (these are the ones you can buy from Jayose).

Since we now have the ability to give specific quality items as quest rewards, this has now been done in some key areas, especially the replacement of master crafted tools. Quests that reward those tools now give regular tools with higher quality. (Instead of a Master Crafted Rock Pick, you now get a 150 quality Rock Pick.) At some point those who already have Master Crafted tools will have those items automatically replaced. You will not have to do the quest again. This also eliminates having to have multiple entries in crafting books for each type of tool.

As always we have been asking players to report quest bugs to us and we think about 100+ quests have had at least one dialogue fix. It's hard to know exactly how many (BIG thanks to all the players who keep reporting them). If you come across a mistake in any new (more likely) or old quest (less likely) please tell us so we can fix them.

We have also added little things such as an alternate paths in Without a Way so you don't always end up having to listen to Levrus talk for ages, and small changes such as the removal of faction rewards from repeatable quests which is the first step into making the faction system 'functional'.


Other
Players have also been reporting bugs in knowledge areas (KAs) to us so we have numerous fixes to piles of KAs (big thanks again to all players to report typos when talking to an NPC or have suggested new dialogue.) We have also expanded the current KAs, which is a slow but steady project. A number of new "action locations" (ALs) have been added in the world to add function to currently inactive objects like doors, and descriptions to other objects like trees (if you read one new books in particular you will see why). A number of current ones have also been adjusted as were broken. "Action Locations" can be triggered just by right clicking on map elements in game.

Known bugs
To give you a chance to get new glyph rewards in quests you may have already done, several quests have been wiped.  One of them is The Coming Eclipse.  But to complete it you need a letter for Datal.  Since the quest that gives that item is the winch access quest, it's way too troublesome to wipe that one.  So to get the letter, you can ask a GM, or if one is not available, file a petition.  This goes for any quest where you need an item from a quest you've already done.  Please do not abuse this.  GMs will be checking if you have the right prerequisites.


Gameboards
Our efforts on gameboards continues, in particular we added games rules to the "Groffel's Toe" gameboard by Brado's tavern in Ojaveda: enjoy playing this simple draughts-like game with a friend and try to occupy the last two tiles of his/her board.


Fixed Bugs/Added Features
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: bilbous on May 11, 2014, 07:02:05 pm
Well done! I feel new purpose blossoming in my life. Hopefully no adverse effects will nip it in the bud and I can post more reports to the tracker.
It may well be time to break out one of my unquesting dweebs and see what I can find from scratch, although I am not sureI have the stamina for that.
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Bonifarzia on May 12, 2014, 03:03:05 am
Congratulations to Venalan, Taya and everyone in the settings team who has worked hard to push this major update. It is good to see that issues are being addressed which are really hard to resolve, but will contribute so much to a more enjoyable game experience.
Also, I would like to thank Eonwind and the rules team for those new features that will now be accessible via the newly released combat and crafting quests. I am really curious how this will turn out!
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Venalan on May 12, 2014, 08:40:42 am
I would like to add that in many of these quests you have choices, steal a statue or give a statue back. Help the thief or not help the thief. Take a guards path, Xiosia path, thieves path, or mages path. When you come across choices like these they all give the same reward at the end, so take the path you are most interested in seeing the story behind. BUT you do still have to do what you are asked by the npcs to get the best ending and rewards. I was very clear with the authors of these quests that all paths should lead to the same reward, to avoid players doing the path that gets the best item over the path they would like to follow.
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Venalan on May 14, 2014, 05:01:22 pm
So an update of quests with bugs so you can all know whats going

Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: bilbous on May 14, 2014, 05:32:39 pm
Thank you for this information update, it will save me looking for some answers to issues. Should I be concerned that I have two merchant syndicate quests available? are there issues regarding me doing a different winch quest that originally done?
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Venalan on May 14, 2014, 05:55:31 pm
Put simply, no, assuming I know what you're referring to.
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: bilbous on May 14, 2014, 05:57:49 pm
OK good, assuming I know what I am talking about :)
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Venalan on May 19, 2014, 07:43:51 am
The quests have been updated so fixing all known quest script bugs.
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Venalan on June 07, 2014, 08:29:14 am
We had another little quest update last night, lots of small dialogue fixes as normal. The most notable fix is to "Moren needs new boots" which will now complete when you hand the boots over.

As always every quest bug I'm told about I will fix, keep telling me every little thing you find. The quicker I get told them the sooner I will have done enough to ask for an update.

Enjoy.
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Roled on June 08, 2014, 11:15:00 pm
Ven et al, thanks for the fixes...

Somehow when I logged back in after the little update RR can no longer move without crashing. I /died to try to escape the paralysis but each time I try to change to third person follow I crash. I crawled to the portal of the DR but each time I enter the portal, I crash.  :@#\ Could you please move RR to spawnQuist while I uninstall /reinstall?  :surrender:

Thanks!
RR
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Jilerel on June 09, 2014, 03:17:07 am
Quote from: Roled on June 08, 2014, 11:15:00 pm
Ven et al, thanks for the fixes...

Somehow when I logged back in after the little update RR can no longer move without crashing. I /died to try to escape the paralysis but each time I try to change to third person follow I crash. I crawled to the portal of the DR but each time I enter the portal, I crash.  :@#\ Could you please move RR to spawnQuist while I uninstall /reinstall?  :surrender:

Thanks!
RR

I had the same problem, I changed my graphics quality, and it works now
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: LigH on June 09, 2014, 05:49:56 am
Also, when it crashes after an update with new art, it might help to delete the shader cache once.

But "dialog fixes in quests" are certainly not art related.

Crashing while switching to third-person view sounds like your character has something equipped which provokes display issues. But you don't crash already on the podium? There your character is visible too.

Ensure to have the latest graphic driver from the website of your mainboard manufacturer or graphic chipset manufacturer. Do not rely on graphic drivers offered by the Microsoft Windows Update.
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Gilrond on June 09, 2014, 01:15:53 pm
Great and long awaited update! I'll take a look at PS again :)
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Venalan on June 09, 2014, 04:44:26 pm
@Roled

There are some rare cases when a player will crash with any spell/particle effect and also while opening/closing certain UI windows. This happened to me.

You should try going to PSlaunch and setting VBO=on in the graphics settings (its a tick box). This immediately fixed the problem for me.
Title: Re: Setting update
Post by: Roled on June 10, 2014, 01:38:47 am
Venalan, LigH, Jilerel, everyone- THANKS
I did everything you each suggested and it worked! Thank you thank you!!!  \\o// \\o// \\o//
RR