april LTTP

[stumpy wallace]

April Letter to the Players





Greetings one and all, and welcome to April's edition of the Asheron's Call Letter to the Players. The AC Live team was hoping that spring would be here by the time of this writing, but alas, there is still snow on the ground. This month's Letter may look a little thin; there aren't too many items we want to discuss, and the majority of the April update involves new content and quests that we'd like you to discover for yourselves. But there are a few issues that bear mentioning.

Rebalancing, Feedback, and the Missile Range Penalty
The monster rebalancing has resulted in a lot of player discussion, both positive and negative, and we want to thank everyone for all the feedback we have received. The AC Live team prides itself on its relationship with players, and the rebalancing process has really highlighted how important player feedback is to us.

The range penalty to missile attack skills serves as a graphic example of the importance of player feedback. As part of our rebalancing efforts last month, we adjusted the missile defense on a large number of creatures across Dereth. The new missile defense levels worked well at close range, but they highlighted a major flaw of the system that had never before been terribly important: the range penalty. Previously, a missile character at full range was operating at about 50% of their normal attack skill, which made hitting level-appropriate monsters from full range extremely difficult. This kind of percentage penalty is especially difficult to overcome at higher skill levels where 50% of your attack skill may mean 200-300 points of skill.

Player feedback made it immediately obvious that the old-style penalty just would not fly in the new, rebalanced Dereth, and so the penalty has been reduced considerably for the April update. Missile characters will still incur a penalty to their attack skill for firing at range, but the new penalty is much reduced: from approximately 20% at the absolute furthest possible range, down to no penalty at all at about half (outdoor) radar range. We will continue to monitor feedback about this change, of course, and may make other adjustments if they become necessary.

The April update will also see another addition of interest to some missile characters: a craftable thrown weapon that can be used with a shield.

Dark Heraldry
Every month one or two players will ask us what will ever become of the unfinished Tumerok Banner quest. We are overjoyed to be able to answer that question with the April update. Of course, you'll have to discover the exact changes yourself, but suffice to say that the military commanders have finally gotten their rewards in order-and just in time to meet a renewed menace!

Change of the Season
Dereth remained draped in winter last month-it was so cold here in Massachusetts, we figured Dereth should be too! Actually, the survival of the snow was a small oversight, and with the April update the snow will recede and the spring flowers will finally appear. If only we could manipulate New England's weather so easily…

So, as we warned you at the beginning, there weren't many issues to discuss in this Letter. Life in Dereth forges on…and portents of dark times and hard choices throng about us. But that, of course, you'll discover on your own. Thanks for reading, and thank you for playing Asheron's Call!

-The Asheron's Call Team

[Pipi]

The Dev's are choads. Thxs bye

[Khaz-Modaan]

Bah, at least back up what you're saying with proof, pips

they do good things, at least -some- of the time