0.5.9.4 release!!

[Talad]

We are proud to present you the 0.5.9.4 release! This release is a big release for settings and rules, meant to improve the fun factor and the interactivity with the world.

Here is the detailed change log:
Art

• New read book layout with two facing pages, including new art
• New icons for crafting books
• New gawert monster added
• Created some new spells effects
• Effect added on Specialized Staves: Blue, Dark, Brown, Red
• Redone Azure Spells casting time
• fixed many spells which lacked effects (Cleanse, Lesser Plague, Mind Paralysation, Minor Earthquake)

Rules

With this big rules release we greatly improved many NPC attack behaviour, now NPCs are able to:

• check their health condition and decide how to behave (heal, flee) based on that
• use special attacks (stun, poison and MORE!) like originally designed by the settings team
• use spellcasting abilities to defend and attack or even heal themselves
• many spells will now trigger specific NPC behaviours (like fleeing when subject to Fear spell)
• assess the player strengths (physical, magical, or both) and decide which attack stance to use
• fixed many NPCs paths in hydlaa (just to name a few: Mirra, Nalri, Rolara, Axomir, Loren, ...), some path may still require some fix.

Update for Crafters:

• the cooking books have been reworked and divided into 3 different categories: the "Art of Baking" (to bake bread and cookies), "Meet and Stews" and the "Pastry Chef Book" (to prepare all kind of sweets)
• a whole new cooking book to cook fish: "Dishes with Fishes" (many thanks to Rheos for designing it)
• new alchemy antidotes have been added to neutralise many poisons and disease effects
• new effects for food: beware eating too much will lead to an indigestion and finally the Kran are be able to eat ores, metals and crystal powders!
• Combat: armor quality damage reduction factor was too high compared to the weapons quality factor, their refactoring should balance PvP combat once more. We expect your feedback and testing.
• Body Development: it is now possible to gain practice points in body development. The skill is now fully usable in game.
• Mining/Harvesting/Fishing practice points and experience update: now those skills will reward a similar amount of practice/experience like all the other crafting skills; the time spent performing the action, the skill required to perform the action and the player skill are all considered in the calculation.

Spells updates:

• 3 new spells are now available in game for brown way: Tower Armour, Armoured Skin and Stone Warp
• fixed many spells system messages (spelling errors and added some messages)
• fixed spells which did not account for magic resistance yet
• spell saving throws compare caster and target's relative way skill

Tribes:

• we have released 2 Gobbles tribes in the bdroad1 map, one aggressive and one more peaceful. Beware the Aggressive are hungry and angry!

Settings

Cooking redo:

• Along with the rules changes to cook books, the quests to award these books have been redone to reflect the recipes in each, including some new quests.
• The cooking chain has been reordered and dialog added to direct you from quest to quest.
• As a result, ALL COOK QUESTS PROGRESS HAS BEEN WIPED (except Mirra's quests, which are their own branch in the chain), beginning with Introduction to the Food Association with Jomed.  This is a good chance for newbies and cooking experts alike to go through the chain and provide feedback and suggestions.  The old cook books have been wiped so you'll have to reacquire the new versions.
• Trainers and merchants have been adjusted to reflect the changes.
• Though small, Jomed's kitchen is now functional.  While it doesn't have the room for a full array of equipment, the existing art (grill, stove, table) now have action locations to make them usable.  Pots, bowls, etc. have been added along with an oven.
• A few additional items have been added in other places as well, like Reffitia's kitchen and Archilaya's area.
• For some quests where you give NPCs food, their responses may vary depending on quality. (e.g., submit a dish for Reffitia for your apprenticeship that is below a certain quality and she may reject it and have you make it again...give her a high quality dish and she will be very impressed).

Other Quests/Quest features:

• Harnquist expands his palette (again): Though not directly in the cooking chain, the Harnquist is Hungry quest has now been expanded to include many many more options. As you increase your cooking and baking skill together, the options for what he asks from you will change and get more complex. This means you will be able to make him dishes according to your skill level. The higher your skills are the more you are asked to do, and the better the rewards for feeding him are. This is something for all you cooks.
• We have introduced a method to make players wait between steps, when an NPC says 'come back later' in some of the newest quests you will actually have to wait. We are testing this out to see how well it fits and for playability, the periods you have to wait are not long and you are given a system message with exactly how long you have to wait and it will also appear as a buff in your active magic window.
• A number of small option changes have made it into a number of current quests which reward glyphs to make them easier to acquire.
• A few new quests have been added which will give more cultural information about the nolthrir.
• Additional quests have been added to allow obtaining an early important blue way glyph easier (pay close attention to what NPCs say to you for you might miss the quest otherwise).

Books:

• Continuing out efforts to expand the released setting, two new ingame books added, check out the libraries and taverns to see what books are available.

KA (Knowledge area), these are what NPCs respond to when you ask them something, like 'about you' in the free text box or use '/tellnpc about you'

• General clean up of KAs and removal of unused or empty ones.
• Added KAs for alchemy in Hydlaa and Ojaveda.
• General improvements to many NPC responses based on requests on forum threads, winch doors and npc info for winch, expanded Gugrontid KAs.
• Ferryd now has proximity KAs for information about training and should address you by rank as you progress up in Red Way Ranks.
• We have added KAs to all the guards in Hydlaa so they can enforce banishment once it is ready to be used by GMs.

NPCs:

• Descriptions for many of the NPCs and NPC types have been replaced with more descriptive versions (75 at last count).
• Some positions should be fixed, like Edrich standing on/in his window.
• Incorrect traits, like enkidukai clan colours, have be corrected.
• Descriptions and held items should match more closely for a few NPCs now.

Miscellaneous:

• continual fixes and improvements to settings, currently at least 26 reported bugs listed as 'Fixed pending release' will make it onto the production server. At least as many other minor fixes reported to settings for quests will also make it onto the production server. Please keep telling us about every little thing you guys find which is wrong.

[Noobstorm]

Thanks for the update, I am enjoying it a lot

many spells will now trigger specific NPC behaviours (like fleeing when subject to Fear spell)

I've tested the spell Fear, it doesn't seem to have an effect on creatures.

[Bonifarzia]

Special thanks to Eonwind, it is really nice to see all the progress of game rules since he joined the team.

[Illysia]

Wow, this was worth stopping to say that I am genuinely impressed with the list here. Hope it works out well in came. Congratz to the current devs.


...And cooking would get cleaned up when I am not really in game and no longer have a dedicated cooking character.

[Venalan]

* Venalan jumps at the opportunity to correct Illysia.... "game*"

But the work done here by Magdora in coding lots of the new NPC functions and by Eonwind by setting up the NPCs is awesome.

[LigH]

* LigH jumps at the opportunity to correct Venalan... "Magodra"

[Bakin_Fundinson]

Thanks to all devs etc for this big improvement, however large or small your contribution -- none named; none forgotten
 
One tiny detail which I find awesome:
If you approach a monster from the rear, trying to hammer it in the back, it will turn around and look at you, evaluating your strength... "You look tasty"
 
Can't wait to find out 1st-hand about all the new neato stuff
(one thing to read about it, another to experience it)

Brgds, Bakin

[Eonwind]

Many thanks to Rheos for designing the new fishes recipes and providing the game data.

[Bonifarzia]

I have the impression stone warp is quite a bit too powerful. I guess the common sense answer is "grind brown way and get save throws against it", but I don't like that concept much.

[Eonwind]

I have the impression stone warp is quite a bit too powerful. I guess the common sense answer is "grind brown way and get save throws against it", but I don't like that concept much.

grinding is not the only option, there is also magic resistance against it and the spell duration is limited, and of course being the first time it's introduced the effects may be revised after some consistent testing in game.
Of course the spell (each new spell effect) was extensively tested before release but actual in-game testing may arise the need to weak it a bit.

[Bonifarzia]

grinding is not the only option, there is also magic resistance against it and the spell duration is limited, and of course being the first time it's introduced the effects may be revised [...]

Agreed, I am well aware of all these points, and I also know this is not the right place for detailed discussions. I'll come back to this later. Oh, and there is also room for potions to negate such effects.

[Taya]

From my testing last night, the duration on this spell actually seemed too short if anything. I don't have high brown to resist with either and the person casting on me to test was many levels higher than I am. You can also still cast while under the effect, so someone not wanting to use spells to fight back could likely use a bow as well as another option.

I haven't tested fully yet, but in general it appears mages are now at a much bigger disadvantage than previously and this spell seems like one of the few things that might give them a shot at still holding their own.

With all that said, in general this update is really impressive and maybe the biggest jump forward I saw all at once like this since I started the game.

[Eonwind]

From my testing last night, the duration on this spell actually seemed too short if anything. I don't have high brown to resist with either and the person casting on me to test was many levels higher than I am. You can also still cast while under the effect, so someone not wanting to use spells to fight back could likely use a bow as well as another option.

I haven't tested fully yet, but in general it appears mages are now at a much bigger disadvantage than previously and this spell seems like one of the few things that might give them a shot at still holding their own.

With all that said, in general this update is really impressive and maybe the biggest jump forward I saw all at once like this since I started the game.

Brown way mages spells' damage is and will be lower than Red Way spells, to balance this they will have spells to protect themselves and to slow their chasers. It's just a little different gameplay.

[Taya]

I meant mages vs. those using combat skills, just in case that wasn't clear. I don't and never have expected brown way (or any way really) to equal red for damage output. I really like the new spells so far.

[tman]

Thanks devs! Always happy to see progress like this!  A very impressive list of updates!