Author: Stargrace

Just another gamer with too much time on her hands.

Game Update – TEST Notes

The original post can be found here on the SoE forums.  PLEASE remember these are on Test server ONLY right now, and are subject to change. There has been a LOT of feedback about the changes, some like them, some do not. Some pretty serious things are incoming in this GU. Thoughts?

 

 

GAMEPLAY

  • Taunts and detaunts can now critical similar to how melee and spell criticals work.
  • Threat output and hate position changes will now be displayed to the chat windows. You can find it under Combat in the Hate Adjustment category.
  • Hate gain mods will no longer affect taunt adjustments.
  • Area of effect spells and combat arts will no longer spread hate to encounter members when damage is applied.
  • Imprisoner Ynosii’s death now results in his weakened soul spawning. Killing the weakened soul gives a key that will open Ynosii’s treasure chest.
  • Auto-follow:
    • Your character will now swim up and down to follow the target underwater.
    • Characters on auto-follow will always turn to face their target when auto-attacking.
    • Players on auto-follow now follow up and down climbable walls.
    • You may now /camp (and, incidentally, sit) while on auto-follow. If the person you’re following moves (causing you to follow) your camp will be interrupted.
    • The camera will now re-center on the person you’re following only when you’re moving.

ACHIEVEMENTS

  • Bountiful Harvest should no longer displayed a combined harvest on root and foresting nodes. Instead you should see two harvests similar to how other node type work.

Warrior

  • Executioner’s Anger now has a chance to increase your taunt critical chance instead of the player’s hate gain.

Crusader

  • Idolic Axe has changed to increase the base amount of the crusaders taunts and gives them an additional chance to critically taunt an enemy.

Assassin

  • Frontload will no longer cause poisons to cancel when it is toggled off or expires.

Berserker

  • Perserverance is now a buff and works in a similar fashion to Reversal with a hidden spell that can only trigger once every 15 seconds.

Brawler

  • Crane Twirl has been changed to increase the brawlers chance to aoe auto attack
  • Eagle Spin now increases the threat of the brawler with their enemy.
  • Eagle’s Talon now increases the chance of the brawler to critically taunt and increases the amount of threat applies by taunts.
  • Monkey Dodge now increases the brawler’s defense and parry skill.

Shadowknight

  • Enchance: Anguish will now increase the base damage of the combat art appropriately.

SPELLS

As a result of spell changes, the triggered effect on Charm’s Way has been changed to be upfront and target enemies in the area of effect.

Fighter

  • Kick has been moved to level 3 to fill in a gap caused by spell consolidation

Guardian

  • The Hold The Line spell line has been merged with the defensive stance lines.
  • The Iron Will Spell line has been merged with both the offensive and defensive stances.
  • The Battle Tactics line has been merged into the Call to Arms line of spells.
  • The offensive stance line will now increase damage done to the guardian and also has a damage based proc while also reducing the hate gain of the guardian.
  • The defensive stance will now also increase the amount of taunts and increase the hate gain of the guardian.
  • The hate reduction of the allay line has been reduced.
  • The Assault line now grants additional threat gains.
  • Reduced the recast of the Shout line.
  • The Kick line now generates additional threat.

Berserker

  • Berserk has been incorporated into the defensive and offensive stances.
  • The Battle Chant line has been merged into the Bloodlust line.
  • The Bullying Defense line has been merged into the defensive stance line.
  • Uproar has been moved to level 2 to fill in a gap created by the ability mergers.
  • The Growl line is now 10 second reuse and more powerful.
  • The Offend line has increased threat.
  • The Whirl line now has a threat component.
  • Reactive taunt strength of the Insolent Gibe line has been increased slightly.

Paladin

  • The Redemption line now greatly increases your threat with the target instead of siphoning hate.
  • The Incite line now increases threat initially instead of overtime.
  • The Charge line now has a hate component.
  • The Divine Circle line now has a hate component.
  • The Blessing of the Penitent and Blessed Weapon lines have been merged into the offensive and defensive stances.
  • The Blinding Rays line has had its reuse time reduced.

Shadowknight

  • The Dark Caress and Unholy Weapon lines have merged into the offensive and defensive stances. 
  • Defensive stance line will lower damage but increase threat output.
  • Offensive stance boosts damage slightly but reduces hate gain.
  • Sickening Circle will also increase threat now.
  • The Kick line now has a threat component.

Bruiser

  • The Roughhouse and Dodge and Strike lines have been merged into the bruiser’s stances.
  • The Brag line is now more potent.
  • The Kick line now has a threat component.
  • The Blazing Strikes line now has a threat component.
  • The Impose line has faster reuse speed now.

Monk

  • The Martial Focus and Dragon stance lines have been merged into the monk’s stances.
  • The Stare line increase threat by more.
  • The Kick line now has a threat component.
  • The Cobra Circle line now increases threat to any targets it hits.
  • Beckon has had its reuse time lowered.

Swashbuckler

  • The Swarthy Distraction line of spells has changed to be a short duration buff which greatly increases or decreases their target’s hate.

Assassin

  • The Shadows line has changed to trigger a hate reduction effect.

Ranger

  • The Reconnoiter line has had its hate reduction effect removed and has a chance on any hit to reduce the rangers hate.

Predator

  • The Stalk line is now faster casting and lower recovery time.

Scout

  • The Evade line no longer has any recovery time.

Sorceror

  • Concussive is now faster casting and quicker reuse time.

Dirge

  • Hyran’s line has reduced hate gain modifiers but also increases the threat amount.

GUILDHALLS

  • Guild Hall Fuel Merchants will now buy back tier 1 fuels.
  • The guild hall mender will now correctly remember the new coverage setting after it is changed.

ZONES

Veeshan’s Peak

  • Milyex Vioren’s engineer should no longer occasionally become unkillable

Palace of Ferzhul

  • Ferzhul should no longer fail to unlock his portion of Varsoon’s portal if players kill all of his adds before killing him.

Village of Shin

  • Merchants in the Village of Shin will now buy as well as sell items.

Moors of Ykesha

  • Spotting a business opportunity, a new fuel merchant has recently set up shop in Firmroot Moot near the mender.
  • It should now be slightly easier to avoid the blood gorgers in the entry passage to Grobb, if you are careful.

ITEMS

  • Overloaded heal procs will now trigger properly from reactives and wards.
  • The Ferocious Presence spell from Stormbringer’s Bulwark of the Unstoppable will suspend if the shield is no longer equipped.

QUESTS

  • Knight-Captain Santis will complete the quest, “Bog Sludge Hunt”.
  • Zoning into the Nasin’s Library on Chapter 4 of The Shadow Odyssey should now automatically zone in a full party, regardless of whether all members have the quest.

MACROS

  • You can now drag equipment from your appearance slots to the macro window.

GROUPS

  • Group members can now use the /invite command to request that the group leader invite a player to the group. Just type /invite <playername>

UI

  • The raid window has a new ‘Advanced’ mode that will display effect icons for all members of the raid. Right-click the raid window to switch views.
  • The carat in text boxes will no longer render if the EQII client doesn’t have focus.
  • Fixed a bug where damage reduction info was not displayed correctly in the mitigation tooltip.
  • Fixed a bug in the raid window sometimes causing users to not be drag-able.
  • The following modifications were made to UIScripting and are may be of interest to the modding community.
  • UIScript now supports the following functions: int(), abs(), floor(), ceil().
  • Results of math operations in UIScript now only return the required precision instead of always forcing 3 decimal places.
  • Fixed a bug parsing negative floating-point numbers.
  • The BackgroundEmpty image of a UIProgressbar will no longer render unless the progress value is zero.
  • Support has been added for a new UIColorStyle object. Any object property that accepts a color will now accept a reference to a UIColorStyle object.

LoTRO: Day 2

First of all, it took me FOREVER to figure out where the screen shots for LoTRO go. I checked in the game folder, and there was nothing there. I ended up doing a search on my computer for ‘screenshot’ and found it way off in it’s own little folder some place completely different where I’d never have found it without doing that search. I realize I’m not the most computer savy person out there, but experience tells me that most of the time, the screen shots are within a screen shot folder that is typically located some where in the game folder. Not so this time around. 

I still haven’t had a whole lot of time to play, but I’m hoping this weekend I’ll get some time in. I’ll be honest, I read people’s write ups and experiences about their games of choice and what I remember most are not the mechanics of a game but how they enjoyed it and what their personal views were. That being said, I know almost nothing about LoTRO. I don’t know anything specific about the classes, I didn’t know there was housing, I don’t know anything about crafting. In a way it’s almost refreshing. It’s also scary, because I typically pride myself on what I DO know about a game. 

So my hobbit minstrel is level 3 now, and let me mention that it took a good 10 minutes for me to try to fit my chubby (and cute might I add) frame through the doorway pictured above. I honestly thought I was going to have to re-create just in order to fit, it took that long. Something new I learned, when you log off in the middle of an instance (quest?) you start back at the beginning when you log on. Or such was my experience. I’d already killed a spider and gotten a pack with a knife in it, but when I logged back in there I was at the inn (again) headed back out to speak with Bounder Boffin. Deja Vu or what. 

I’m also sporting a new pair of gloves (I think they were gloves, it was a slight blur as I was distracted by a chicken) and have a few coin to my name. I trained in my first skill. The UI is very easy to understand, although EQ2’s maps have spoiled me over the past few years. Once I was dumped off in the little starting village I ran around looking at things and poking random people to see what they’d do. I saw a few others also running around. I haven’t quite gotten the hang of my quest journal yet, and I’ve got a way to go before I can remember what hotkey does what. At least attacking is exactly the same as what I’m used to, so I’ve got that taken care of and just need to figure out the other aspects. 

I feel a little like an awkward teenager fumbling my way around, but it’s enjoyable and hopefully I don’t mess up too much. Look for me in game as Petites, my impressions are still pretty favourable in the mean time – not that I can justify them since I’v barely stuck my little baby toe into middle-earth.

Happy gaming!

Another Title to the List

Why I never picked up LoTRO before now is still a mystery to me. I’ve picked up pretty much every other title out there from EQ1 to WAR and gave them all at least the free month that came with the game. Since I don’t typically play console games myself spending the $40-50 every few months to test out a new game  has become some what of the norm for me. 

KTR was kind enough to toss a 10-day trial my way, which happens to be on a founders account. Before I even stepped into the game I was impressed. While other games do typically have some sort of ‘recruit a friend’ program these days having a reduced subscription and the offer of the life time subscription is a huge bonus. I was going to start downloading the client, but not being a huge fan of 2+ day downloads, I picked up the box at EBGames. Vlcan pointed out that Best Buy is going to have Mines of Moria (the complete edition) on sale for $19.99 so if you’ve been on the fence about this game get a hold of a founder and maybe think about picking it up. I didn’t mind paying the full price for it because I got a lot more then I bargained for – EBGames here in Ottawa happened to still have pre-order copies kicking around and I snagged one of those.

Not only was I already impressed before I logged in due to the recruit-a-friend (and a very smooth set up for that might I add, the interface to set up an account was really nice) but I love the goodies that came with the pre-order. What did we get with EQ2? Well, that pewter bear that collects dust on the top of my desk. What did I get with the LoTRO pre-order? A CD of all of the music, the ability to subscribe myself for $9.99 a month or get the life time for $199, and three unique in game items. A cloak, a title, and some in game tokens that I have no idea how to work yet but they were in my bags when I created.

When I upgraded my account from trial to a full member they didn’t just take away my 10 free days either, it was added to my account along with the free 30 days for purchasing the game so I have a bit of time before I’ll start to be charged for it. At $9.99 a month I won’t be complaining. 

Installation went smooth, it took less then an hour to install the two DVD’s, patch the game, and create my first minstrel hobbit, Petites. After the advice of others on twitter, I created on the Landroval server which is where I believe a few CoW members are hanging out amongst others. I honestly don’t know enough about the servers to have a secure preference yet. 

The introduction videos were a lot of fun to watch, I’ve always enjoyed them the first time through no matter what the game. I didn’t get to play a whole lot since by the time I got everything settled, (yesterday was another day of family stuff) installed, patched and what not I was looking to play a little EQ2 before bed, but what I did play I really liked. 

I enjoyed the character creation process. The characters look good. They look crisp and clear and while there are not a HUGE amount of options, there are enough to let me have fun playing with it. The characters themselves sort of remind me of WAR in colour and graphic, not necessarily a bad thing. Of course like every other game I play the first thing I do is re-map all of my keys to something I’m used to and more comfortable for me. That means getting rid of the WASD keys and changing them to the arrow keys on the number pad. After 7 years of gaming if I can’t move around in the way I’m most used to, it’s a deterrent. The game ran really really smooth, the UI was clutter-free even though it will take me some time to figure out how everything works, where it all is, and what it means. I picked up the first quest I saw after logging in (of course after putting on my cloak) and headed off down a road to talk to someone and smush some spiders. Combat was a little confusing to me but I was also trying to play EQ2 on the laptop at the same time which was a bad idea. 

Over all though my impressions (so far) have been very positive, and I’m looking forward to exploring middle-earth. I should have more solid time this weekend to play, and for $9.99 a month you really can’t go wrong.

Quiet on the gaming front

Ah yes, graphic card over heating again. As much as I love the quality and detail of the 8800 I have (I know, not that impressive) the little 7600 I had sure was sturdy. I’ve turned up the fans on the video card, but I’m reluctant to turn them up any more. I’m not a computer wiz, so it’s amazing I managed that much (with some help). The fans were barely sitting at 20% when I first fiddled. 

Anyhow. Yesterday was a fairly quiet day gaming wise. I checked sales on various characters, and bounced around waiting to get phone calls from hospitals about real life stuff going on. Interesting day. Thanks again to all of those people who have been exceptionally supportive, and please know I appreciate it so much. I don’t mean to cloud my gaming site with ‘reality’ but alas it rears it’s ugly head from time to time. 

I’ve created a coercer on the Kithicor server to play with a group of friends over there on nights when things are quiet on Najena. So far after two days I’m level 36 – the 50% bonus experience on my account due to 5 level 80’s has REALLY come in handy. As has the orb of concentrated memories that replenishes vitality weekly and the good friends grouping with me. I have some master charms waiting for me, level 33 and level 61 which I’m really eager to use, managed to get them at a steal, for 5p. There’s no difference between the 61 charm and the 74 charm aside from the extra 5 minutes that it lasts, eager, yes I am!

That was pretty much the extent of my gaming, hopefully things will settle back down into routine and I’ll have a few more interesting stories to tell. I’ve been contemplating picking up LoTRO because I’ve yet to play it or try it at all and a few friends are giving it a whirl. Haven’t quite made my mind up yet though. One of those “we’ll see” moments.

Safe travels and happy gaming no matter where you are!

New Outfit and other Ramblings

Goudia managed to gain enough factions and tokens with the Far Seas division to finally purchase some new gear as well as those level 79 recipes that she can’t make yet but will be able to before too long. Have you ever wondered what those recipes (each with five charges) makes? Well, take a peek over at Kasul’s site, he has a post  all about them here. There are some pretty amazing items that crafters can make though the components are going for a fair amount here on Najena. The recipes require 40,000 faction with the Far Seas division which is not impossible to obtain but does take a little time. 

Anyhow, Goudia managed to collect her tokens and grind out five writs for faction so it was time for a new set of gear including a new black cloak. I don’t know if the pieces will actually help me craft any better, but here’s hoping. 

The little alchemist is also level 70 now, only 10 more to go! Those Far Seas instances were a LOT of help in reaching that level, and I’m looking forward to helping Nostalgia out and doing writs for the last 10 levels. We’re continuing to inch our way to level 40 which is a huge milestone for us. 

I didn’t really get any gaming time in yesterday. There are some pretty major real life things going on as anyone who follows me on Twitter knows, so I’ve been slightly preoccupied. 

Short term goals? Get the templar upgraded, work on her achievements. I still want to finish decorating the guild hall at one point or another, as well as various other homes I have in the midst of construction. This includes the necromancer one room I have in Big Bend that has been a (slow) work in progress between everything else. I’d still like to revamp Stargrace and Arysh’ homes, they’ve been the same way for over three years now and they could use a face lift. So much decorating to do and only so much time in a day!

I haven’t gotten any further with searching for a raid guild yet, then again I haven’t really looked. We’ll have to see how the real life stuff pans out first before I can dedicate the time that would be required. One of these days I WILL complete enough Moors quests to purchase the faction recipes. Maybe. 

Safe travels no matter what game you play.