[AC] September LttP

[Kezz]

[turbine]

http://ac.turbine.com/?page_id=481

September 2006 Letter to the Players


Hello there and welcome to the September Letter to the Players!

With Grael finally defeated the people of Dereth can now breathe a sigh of relief. The sky has now returned to normal and the sun is once again a bright spot crossing it. Now is a time for celebration as we approach Fall and the Festival season. The celebrations this year should be grand, as the people of Dereth have once again proven they can overcome any foe.

Now let's see what's new and exciting this month in Asheron's Call!


New Content and Updated Functionality

With the Launch of Throne of Destiny, a tremendously dangerous area was added on the Isle of Ruin in the Halatean Isles. This valley has generally been avoided by most players, other than those who are traveling to dungeons near this valley. In order to make this area more useful to players who prefer outdoor hunting, we have begun making revisions to this area starting this month. This is a work in progress and in the coming months we will continue to work on improving this area.

This month we are introducing Non Combat Pets into Dereth. These pets have no combat features to start with, and are there solely to look cute. While we would love to add combat pets into the game, at this stage we want to make sure that any pets added fit into the overall balance of the game and don't throw that balance out of whack. At the start you will have 4 pets to choose from; an Armoredillo, Drudge, Thrugus, and of course the cute Ursuin. Players will be able to have all four pets, but only one pet per player is allowed out at a time. The Pets will not be killable, and they will not be able to block doorways or entrances of any kind.

Another new feature being added this month is Uninscription Stones. These are just what they sound like. Players will be able to purchase the stones from a vendor for a fee. Once they have the stone they can use it on any loot generated non unique item to remove the inscription from that item. If you have a player inscription on a quest item, the stone will not remove the inscription. It will also not remove the inscription from items such as the Pack Cow.

NPC's will now recognize that the stack size of Pyreals has been increased to 25000. Last month the NPC's did not get the memo about the increase in the Pyreal stack size. This made the change less exciting for those who had been asking for this change.


In Concept

These are game changes that we are thinking about for upcoming events. We cannot guarantee when or even if these changes will be added to the game, as scheduling and priorities can change. These changes are in addition to the new quests, dungeons, and items we will be adding to the game. With each monthly event we will be discussing an in concept topic, in order to give you as much information about the item that we can.

One of things we are looking at going forward is how we can improve crafting. We know this is a kind of broad statement, but at this point we are looking at the crafting system as a whole and trying to determine what changes can be made to improve this already robust system. When we have more specific details on this we will post more information on what direction we want to go and what improvements will be made.

We are also investigating the possibility of Buffing Pets. These are pets that can cast simple buffs on the person who controls them. This of course brings up balance questions, so we are taking things very slowly when it comes to any pet skills we add to the game.



So there are just some of the things we have in store for Asheron's Call in September and beyond. Please remember that along with everything listed here, there are several new quests and exciting things going into the game for the September event.