Daily Update - 10/31/05 (by
Frelorn)
Good afternoon and Happy Halloween!
Things are on schedule for the November event and it is looking good. That
is about it for now.
Everyone have a safe and happy Halloween.
See you in Dereth!
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/1/05 (by
Frelorn)
Hi there folks. We hope everyone had a safe and happy Halloween.
We have posted the latest update to our live events page. This update
celebrates the Halloween holiday. You can find the page
here.
Things are continuing to move forward for the November update, and it is
looking good. It is a great time to be a citizen of Dereth.
We have been listening to your feedback and we want to let you know that the
"In Concept" section of the Lttp will be returning for the November event.
That's about it for now. Everyone have a good night.
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/2/05 (by
Frelorn)
I would like to start off by saying Happy Anniversary Asheron's Call! We
are 6 years old today!
We would like to thank all of the former and current AC team members as well
as you the players for 6 years of fun, adventure and excitement in the land
of Dereth. It has been a long journey and we are looking forward to
continuing the journey for a long time to come!
Thank you everyone, from all of us here at Turbine.
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/4/05 (by
Frelorn)
Good afternoon everyone. I hope we are all ready for a fun weekend of
playing AC. I know that I am.
Things are still looking good for the November event and it is still set to
be on Wednesday, November 16th.
As promised here is the
early teaser
pic that that I spoke of yesterday. There will some more in the coming
week as we get closer to the November event.
Thats it for now. Everyone have a great weekend and see you in Dereth!
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/7/05 (by
Frelorn)
Good afternoon everyone. I hope that everyone is having a good Monday.
(As if there is such a thing.)
The November update which has been tentatively named Ashes and Dust is still
on schedule and is looking good. In the words of a semi famous sports
announcer, "Business is about to pick up!"
We also just wanted to point out that the latest version of
Decal has been released. Make sure to check out the latest updates.
That's it for now. Everyone have a great day, and we will see you in Dereth!
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/8/05 (by
Frelorn)
The November update Ashes and Dust is still set to go live on November
16th, and it is looking good. That of course means that the November Letter
to the Players will be released this upcoming Friday.
That's it for now. Everyone have a great day, and see you all in Dereth!
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/9/05 (by
Frelorn)
Hi there everyone. I hope we are all having a good day so far.
We have been very busy getting things ready for the November event Ashes and
Dust. We are really looking forward to this event and some of the things
that will be happening with it. Dereth will never be the same again.
As I said earlier this week you will be getting the November Letter to the
Players Friday, as well as some new teaser images to go along with it.
That is all for now. I hope everyone has a great night!
See you in Dereth!
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/10/05 (by
Frelorn)
Hi there everyone. Sorry for the delay on this update, things have been a
bit crazy today.
There isnt actually a whole lot to update you on. The November LTTP will be
out tomorrow as well as the teaser images. Everything is still on time and
looking good.
Thats about it. Everyone have a good night.
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
PvP Improvements - 11/11/05 (by
Frelorn)
We know that the PvP community has been feeling a bit left out as of
late, and we want to rectify this as soon as we can. Anything we add or
change that involves PvP requires a lot of testing to make sure that it can
be balanced. That being said, we wanted to come here and get your feedback
on a couple of the ideas that we had mind. Please understand that we have
not tested these ideas nor have we ironed out all the technical barriers to
implementation. But before we go ahead and attempt something like this we
want you, the players to let us know what you think. Now, I know what you
will say… What about the ideas we have already given to you? We still would
like to implement some of these ideas, but a lot of them require a great
amount of tech time and testing, and we do not want to rush into anything
that could make things worse instead of better.
The first idea we have discussed is a way for players to add a moderate
bonus to any pre-existing Slayer effect on whatever weapon they are wielding
at the time. There of course would be limitations to this so that it could
not be exploited or abused.
The second idea was along the same lines as the one listed above, except
this would be a way to add a moderate bonus to the attack mod of the weapon
you are wielding. The same rules would apply, meaning there would be some
limitations to this so that the ability would not be abused. Also note that
the bonus to the attack mod would be on top of any tinkering that may have
been done to the weapon.
What we want from you the players is feedback on what you think about these
two ideas. I will again say that we have not even tested this yet and we are
not sure that the current tech will allow us to do these things. We felt it
was important to get your feedback on these things before we went forward
with attempting any of these ideas.
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Respec Timer Redesign - 11/11/05 (by
Calandryll)
As mentioned before, we pulled the respec timer out of November in order
to incorporate more of your feedback. Originally we thought we'd only make
small changes, but after going through the ideas, it turns out the design
for the respec timers was a little bit bigger of a change to the original
system than we first intended it to be.
So instead of waiting until after November, we're posting it now to get your
feedback as early as possible. We think these changes make the system a lot
more useable and much cooler.
http://ac.turbine.com/?page_id=422
Please feel free to post feedback in this thread.
__________________
-Jonathan "Calandryll" Hanna
Live Producer, AC
Turbine, Inc.
Daily Update - 11/11/05 (by
Frelorn)
Hi there folks. It has been a busy day here, so let's get right into
whats going on today.
The November Letter to the Players has been posted. You can find it
here.
You can post your comments to the LttP on
this thread.
We have also posted the fiction and a couple of screenshots
here.
The changes that we are suggesting for the Respec\Unspec system have been
posted. You can find the link and the discussion in
this thread.
We have also posted a thread on some PvP changes we have suggested. You can
find that thread
here.
Thats about it for now. I hope everyone has a great weekend!
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Daily Update - 11/14/05 (by
Frelorn)
Good afternoone everyone. I hope that you all had a great weekend. We
have a couple of things to update for you, so let's get right to it.
Katrina Billing
We have decided to extend the free billing period for players in the areas
affected by Hurricane Katrina until January 1st 2006. After this date all
subscriptions will return to their normal billing cycles. We will also
continue to pay in-game housing maintenance for all players until that same
date.
Quick Addition: We are aware that a few players in the affected areas were
billed in early November. We are looking into this and will post an update
soon.
Account Migration
On December 7th 2005 we will be turning off the ability to migrate accounts
through our three point authentication system or through our billing
department. This change is being made due a necessary update to our billing
system. If you have any accounts that you have not migrated by this point
you will not have the ability to do so after December 6th 2005.
We are also continuing to get your feedback on the spec/respec timers and
will be posting an updated version later today.
Also a reminder that the November event Ashes and Dust will be going live
this upcoming Wednesday the 16th.
That’s it for now. Everyone have a good day.
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc
Re: Respec Timer Redesign- 11/14/05 (by
Lupus Argenteus )
Well, we asked for feedback, and we certainly received it, with opinions
ranging all over the spectrum. To an extent, this was expected. To address a
few points:
1.Why don't you use a 1 day/no timer?
We would like template selections to mean something. We encourage you to
make new characters when you want to try a new template, rather than
respeccing each time. The ability to retrain is there, but we do not wish to
completely trivialize it.
2.Why don't you leave the timers at 2 weeks?
There is a significant part of the population who has been asking for some
change. We are attempting to implement something which will allow templates
broken by past games systems changes to be mended, while still assigning a
level of importance to early choices.
3.Why don't you implement a cool-down timer?
We believe that currently players are familiar enough with the current game
mechanics to be able to decide what sort of character they wish to play. In
the past, when we have made major changes to games systems (such as the
implementation of the Salvaging skill) we have given characters free
untrains of the skills affected - this is something we will continue to
consider when we make major gameplay changes. Between those two points, we
believe that there is no need for a cool-down timer on retrains.
4.Why does it affect other players what I play?
We must balance the gameplay of Asheron's Call against the entire community
of characters. In this sense, yes, what one player's choices are for their
character affects the game and the players around them.
We have taken several of the comments into consideration. Here is the
revised retrain proposal:
Untrain
1st-4th gems: Instant
5th-8th gems: 1 week timer
9th-16th gems: 2 week timer
17th and above: 3 week timer
Specialization
1st-2nd gems: Instant
3rd-4th gems: 1 week timer
5th-8th gems: 2 week timer
9th and above: 3 week timer
Attribute
1st-18th: Instant
19th-36th gems: 1 week timer
37th and above: 2 week timer
We will not place a 3 month quest timer on turning in a Tessera after all.
However, there will still be a 2 week hand-in timer on Tesserae.
Daily Update - 11/15/05 (by
Frelorn)
Hi there everyone. I hoe we are all having a good day. Let's get right to
our update today.
A reminder that tomorrow is update day! That means all worlds will be down
from 9am to 2pm EST in order for us to bring the November event Ashes and
Dust live. Normally I would have these times up on the launcher and on the
State of the Network page already, but I am having some difficulty updating
the website today. We are looking into why I am having trouble, and
hopefully we can have this resolved by tomorrow.
If this trouble continues into tomorrow then I will be posting the Rollout
Article and the Dev Notes here on the forums until we can get the troubles
fixed.
Please remind those in your allegiance about the downtime tomorrow in case
we are not able to get the message up on the launcher.
That's it for today. Everyone have a good night and see you all in Dereth!
__________________
Andy "Frelorn" Cataldo
AC Community Relations
Turbine, Inc