Monthly Development Update – 31st of January, 2014

[Traderjill]

Giving desirable things to a profession that is considered less desirable is a bad thing now? :P

The thing that kinda confuses me about this is that I really don't see how a rezz sickness remover is going to make keepers more desirable team mates. Not joking around or anything but under what scenario would someone, that otherwise wouldn't want a keeper, invite one just for that rez sickness nano? This is a real question btw, there might be some genius use for it but it simply isn't coming to mind atm. The only scenario I can think of where this might matter would be PvP related though I'm not clear that's what Genele was referring to when she stated that doctors were already desirable team mates.. sounded like a PvE reference to me.

I have played games that have 'revive on the spot' type spells where, if those same games had rez sickness (which they don't), this would come in handy. But if you die in AO, you're teleported to your save spot and well by the time you get back to wherever you were you're halfway rezzed anyway. I'm probably overlooking some blatantly obvious practical use of the program.. I'm sure someone on the forums will point out my shortsightedness soon enough.

[Glarawyn]

The thing that kinda confuses me about this is that I really don't see how a rezz sickness remover is going to make keepers more desirable team mates.

You don't? 12m goes to hell, Enforcer goes splat. Remove Rez sick from tank and doc and get back to it faster. In those cases where something isn't a total wipe getting a player or two out of Rez sick quickly could be helpful.

[Traderjill]

You don't? 12m goes to hell, Enforcer goes splat. Remove Rez sick from tank and doc and get back to it faster. In those cases where something isn't a total wipe getting a player or two out of Rez sick quickly could be helpful.

Actually that did come to mind but that happens to be one of the couple places where people actively already seek out keepers. Sounded to me like Genele was saying they gave keepers this nano to make them more desirable as in wanted in additional places... 12man doesn't fit the bill for that.

[Traderjill]

Just wait 'till you see what's coming to the Item Store & THEN start crying over Pay to Win...

What's coming to the item store?

[Leetlover]

I once tried to get a friend to play ao I showed them a screenshot of 30 dogs fighting over a control tower and he said "WTF kind of garbage are you playing?"

Kinda funny to see agent in ruse + wolf chasing adv around the map.

[Abcewaitwhat]

Kinda funny to see agent in ruse + wolf chasing adv around the map.

That is soo true... Morphs are a important part of AO imo.. no other game has it and seeing a big ass leet coming my way in pvp allways makes me wanna run.

However i tried playing a adv once years ago and i ended up being sick for over a week and couldnt find out why.. apparently the game gave me crazy motion sickness and even with nodob cam i still feel it when im morphed hehe.
However id say that memory is a strong ensentive for me to vote to keep morphs not remove them.

I mean honestly if they are going to make the adv proff into a WoW druid then the advs might aswell go play WoW.

Id be happy to see the changes and how they work but i for one really hope they keep all of these changes in the beta for MONTHS and MONTHS after the NDA is lifted so we can find out if its a game breaker or not.

[Gaoxin]

What's coming to the item store?

An upgraded version of the Manex Catastrophe December, which can be used instead of alien weapons. Manex was so badass pre SL. x) jk

[Abcewaitwhat]

An upgraded version of the Manex Catastrophe December, which can be used instead of alien weapons. Manex was so badass pre SL. x) jk

This is a good example af what NOT! to have buyable..
Convinience items, not out right pay to win items.

[Xootch]

You don't? 12m goes to hell, Enforcer goes splat. Remove Rez sick from tank and doc and get back to it faster. In those cases where something isn't a total wipe getting a player or two out of Rez sick quickly could be helpful.

disregarding that this is like the worst case you could make as 12m is really the one thing keepers are wanted for...this is nonsense. the time it takes for people to gather and buff up its usually not much waiting for rezz anyhow.

if you make an argument, dont be a pvm carebear. nothing matters in pvm. the hold up by rezzing is really not an issue there.

but in pvp death becomes pointless. that that does have consequences. like it is in bs where you die to remove trader drain procs, mp buffs and the like because its just faster than waiting it out and no other way to remove it (but dont fix that fc, rather work on stuff that isnt broken!!), killing someone makes them return within no time at full force. this will be devastating for tara. but tower wars will suffer equally.

[Aiken]

What's coming to the item store?

You'll see. I can't/won't say much more or they'll shout at me from great big heights or something.
But, I. do. not. like it at all right now.

[wonderland]

The only concern I have with the targeted sickness removal is that I imagine it'll be like wake up call, where you'll only ever see like one or two people use it on you in PvP when you really need it. But other than that mixed feelings.

The init debuff change and siphon nano should be useful for new players. I guess this also means we could actually remove bureaucrat debuffs and doctor init debuff procs with rod/hale and hearty/all that other crap now? If so (and hoping I didn't misread that) holy crap, about time.

Also, while I loved the wolf bonuses for most professions, holy crap will I be glad not to see them all the time. On that note, though, what about grafts? Just in general.

We will likely make changes that are not in the nano documents as we have gotten certain code support that we didn't expect to get when the nano documents were made (Like the ability to actually delete/purge nano programs from the game database.) As a general rule; the changes we make will have a basis in the nano documents, but will likely not be identical. I will also not spend more tine on making new nano documents as it is clear now that we will have to release systems changes bit by bit and ensure that changes that are tightly related to each other will get updated at the same time.

This is probably the best option, as I would really like the security of knowing that one large rebalance patch will not possibly competely crap on this game's PvP.

Also, when would a hypothetical beta tester be able to move their play characters over to the beta server? If that's not already possible.

[Leetlover]

That is soo true... Morphs are a important part of AO imo.. no other game has it and seeing a big ass leet coming my way in pvp allways makes me wanna run.

My biggest issue with them is that they are so fugly now, and they lack in animations.

[Nanofat]

Unsurprisingly, I'm looking forward to seeing what this new push towards having few nano programs does to Nano-Technician.

Ever since the NT Rebalance Document hit what... nearly 4 years ago now? I've been of the opinion that AO needs a bit of a drastic change - just to keep things fresh.

I've come to realise we need to listen - but not take too seriously any complaints or concerns from the playerbase as these changes occur; nothing in the process of evolution is beautiful and nothing is ever set in stone.

Trust that the Devs want whats best for AO and that we'll get there eventually.

[DrUrban-II]

I really hope that engi/mp/crat pet nano change wont screw up twinks. If all of them scales from nanoskills, it would be really bad.

For example, i want to use pet that doesn't go OE after mochams runs out, but with mochams & scaling pet, it would cast 1 lvl too high pet for that ... baaaad!

Simple solution: Make only the newb isle pet nano to scale and leave rest for more experienced players!

And what comes to res sickness buff, -.- /facepalm (Yes, i got an 220 keeper (pvm))

[gresh]

Nanofat +1

[doctorgore]

I "think" this is how its going to work, you cast a pet if you have the nskills over by say 100 the pet will be made with stats+10% or some number etc if its 200 over 20% more etc and won't go OE maybe...

[Le-Quack]

yeah i agree nanofat, but the many years old promise and beeing stuck with the same in game for this many years without a single change... its just stupid.

and for some professions on the bottum it jus gets realy retarded that there hasnt ben a single adjustment to balance em up a little before balance

[Bambam]

I'll just !@#$%^ about the loss of advie (other) morphs and leave it at that...

Muahahahahaha!!! Guess it's finally safe to idle at OA then.

[Emma]

With the reduced number of nano's needed because eventually most of them will scale with your nano skills ... what happens to the bags of nano's we all have saved for use by alts, guildies, and other friends? Will they become worthless, or all turn into the same nano?

Is this change expected to extend to nano-lines that currently drop dyna-only at higher levels, so we don't have to camp dyna's for our higher nano's? I am thinking of fixer long-hots, some of the keeper nano's, solder gun buffs, etc. that currently are dyna only except for one of two smaller ones in the nanoline.

Emma

[gresh]

Thanks Genele for the update Nice to know things are rolling along. Looking forward to the changes although my alts are gonna miss the parrot from my advy. Look forward to things hitting live and seeing the changes in play Keep up the good work.