by Moorgard on 2001-08-31
Who's Going to Ride Your Wild Horses?A poster on the Shaman's Crucible has relayed some quotes from the Computer Games article in which Jeff Butler talks about horses being available in the Shadows of Luclin expansion.
"You will be able to buy horses from horse traders, for a price-a hefty price. The thought is that they will be symbols of status, and the desire is that the more exotic appearances or higher maximum velocities wll be more expensive" - Jeff Butler
Butler goes on to say that the horse will simply be a part of your character model rather than a separate NPC--in other words, it can't be killed or harmed on its own. You can fight and cast from horseback, but the rules about remaining still while casting continue to apply.
The most interesting thing mentioned is that horse size will be scaled to the size of your race. Halflings will get little ponies, while ogres will have one of those Budweiser horses to tramp around on.
So are horses a good thing? No, no, and no. Even if steeds are confined to the new Luclin zones, I envision horrible geometry and warping issues that will chew up vast amounts of developer resources to fix. And you know Verant would fix the horses before other bugs, because horses are suddenly becoming a big selling point for Luclin.
Plus, those damn things just make a mess all over the place, and last I checked, pooper scoopers weren't in the item database.
Now You See Them, Soon You Won't
Yesterday, we reported on Lum the Mad's discovery of the fact that server population numbers have disappeared on Test server. Lum's message board received a reply from Smed on this subject, in which he basically says that Verant has no desire to provide specific player data to its competitors anymore.
Smed said:
Well, rather than let speculation run rampant, I thought I'd get very specific.
Due to the increasing amount of competition in the online gaming space we feel that it's not in our best interests as a company to provide our existing and future competitors with valuable information on our userbase. We have always had a very open stance on the issue of what our numbers are specifically, but as we grow in other markets around the world this information is simply not something our competition needs to know. We recognize that changing our stance on something like this makes many people wonder why, so there's your answer.
It's as simple as that.
Smed
...
We are about to put up a system that will let people know relatively how crowded the servers are. We recognize this is something that's important to let people know.
...
Hmmm...
Honestly, it's got more to do with some upcoming moves we're making to expand EQ and our desire to capitolize on this expansion than any one particular product. I'm absolutely not saying we don't consider any of the products competition. We obviously do, and we take them seriously... but if you try something in business, and it works.. no point letting the competition know how well it worked (and yes, I realize we're operating on the assumption that our ideas will hopefully work out).
Anyone who is in business and fails to look over their shoulder often is usually not going to be at the front of the pack.
It doesn't really bug me much that the number itself is going away, as long as we get some idea of how crowded the server is. What I really want to know is how to get Smed to reply to articles on Mobhunter.
The Most Balanced Class in EQ Becomes Too Powerful
Okay, not really, but a headline like that will stick in the craw of lots of friends of mine when they realize that I'm talking about paladins.
Battaile Fauber, one of our faithful readers, has parsed the ol' spdat file once again, and reports the following spell changes:
G'bye:
(L49) Wave of Life (Group Heal: 110 max)
(L52) Divine Fortitude (HP Buff: 50 max)
(L60) Worbolution (single target Mini-Aegolism)
Hello:
(L49) Thunder of Karana (Stun, 2 second duration)
(L52) Valor of Marr (Self only haste, 20%)
(L60) Crusaders Protection (Group Increase HP Base 200hp)
Renamed:
(L58) Wave of Divinity (660pt group heal) is now called Nife's Touch
Actually, self-only haste does piss me off. Granted, 20% more damage out of a paladin is roughly equal to a level 7 cleric hitting a lava beetle with a cracked staff, but it's the principle of the thing.
Thanks for the info, Battaile. Now I can work on getting those spells nerfed! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
A Really, Really Nice Thing
Some peope think Verant is the evil empire. I've never thought that. They're a bunch of folks like you and me who happen to do a job that affects nearly half a million people on a daily basis, and they have their ups and downs like anyone else.
Well, Verant just had an "up." A big one, in my book. No, it wasn't a bug fix, or a free zone, or a new expansion. It was the fact that a company used its resources to make the life of a very sick kid better for one special day.
Remember When Phone Phreaking Was All the Rage?
Lum the Mad relates a story from the Seattle Times Web site that details the seizing of ten computers from some kids who hacked into Verant's systems--including the home computer of Brad McQuaid. Contained in the information stolen were documents relating to a game currently in development: EverQuest 2.
Arrests have yet to be made, but one would suspect that they will be soon. The two hackers face up to five years in federal prison, depending on the charges.
How does this breach of corporate security affect you and me? Hard to say at this point. Our login and credit card information may well be floating somewhere in cyberspace, or perhaps the 17-year-old mastermind of this whole thing just wanted to hurt Sony/Verant, not the users. As the break-in happened last October, one would suspect that if something bad was going to happen, it would have already.
The cautious among us will change our passwords, just to be safe, as we let our thoughts drift to what those EQ2 documents might have to say about our future.