2021 Mid Year Update

Ictinus

Hi everyone!

As we've just crossed the halfway point of 2021, I wanted to touch base on behalf of the producer team with a bit of a look back of what the year has held so far, and offer some teasers for what's to come in the second half of the year.

So far this year:

- Our latest class, Pariah, was released.

- Ghezavat, a commune under the Mhojave, was opened to the world.

- Crixos won the Championship Games and the Staff of Nicator in a fierce competition.

- Pandora's troublemaking shenanigans continued with the saga of Wayward Heights.

- Ancient Kasmarkin was raised from the depths, culminating in the release of a multi-stage honours quest centring around the ancestral history of the trolls.

- The chefs of Achaea learned to train rhinoceros beetles in the search for a coveted new ingredient: Midlands Roe.

- Toby Treacletart took up the adventuring life after departing Gorshire, only to be murdered for science and dissected in the Dicondron Academy. But fear not, he returned from the halls of death only slightly more cynical about adventurers!

- City salaries and the city guide system were released.

- A massive and complete overhaul to hunting damage was released, bringing our classes far closer together on this front.

- The relics system was updated to be more accessible and provide more avenues for conflict.

- THINKing now exists and has become one of our most popular roleplaying tools.

- The first Great Hunt of the year took place in June.

- The Underworld politics system was finally overhauled in a major update.

- Forays underwent significant balance tuning and changes to bring the relative difficulty closer to a consistent point.

- Dozens more quests across the land were integrated into the formal quest system (with many dozens more to come).

Looking ahead to Quarter 3 and Quarter 4 of 2021, you can expect:

- At least one additional new area will be released.

- Updates and fixes to the voyage system are still planned.

- Expansions to the quest system will continue.

- A slew of updates to the war system and its surrounding conflict mechanisms are planned and currently in discussion (the recent updates to guards and security mechanics are a precursor to this).

- The underdeveloped lore and history surrounding at least two of our player races will be explored and expanded.

- Achaea's 24th birthday is in September and the Adryn games tournament will be returning with an updated format to celebrate, as well as a visit from the Itinerant Bazaar, and a ctf!

- The last classlead round of the year will open in October.

- Mayaween and Logosmas celebrations will return, with fun new features for both!

Plus some special things I can't talk about, and a million other things we haven't thought of yet!

- Icti, Nic, Mak

Astarod

RIP Paladin Rework.

RIP earrings.

RIP people who only do Mirror Tower foray.

Elyon

@Astarod I'm sure all 3 paladins are very upset

Astarod

@Elyon we have a lot of paladins. I know this because we have no runewardens.

Greys

Any chance we are getting back those voyages that are currently unavailable? Hate the gaps in quest log completed oceans.

Ictinus

@Greys The answer to this is tentatively yes. I'm hoping to have at least the Tourist's Voyage back in play very soon. The Grievous Voyage is another matter but it is on the list for a remake to close the various loopholes and such.

Adrik

I sure hope the lore for certain races (Siren and Satyr) are explored more.

Also for Satyrs to get a stat rework (or the race vs stat system overhauled as a whole) because..

BOY HOWDY. Do i never want to play a satyr and lose 3 con for +1 str,int, and dex.

Eurice

I hold dreams that one day something close to Aetolia's statpacks will be pulled over into Achaea so we can play whatever race fits our character instead of needing to mechanically bounce between a bunch of them.

Give me a 15 int human, dammit. :(

Otherwise, this all looks very cool. I am looking forward to learning more about the glorious Grook empire.

Caladbolg

@Elyon

I would totally have picked up Paladin if Runwarden wasn't straight better in everyway already combat wise than Paladin...

@Astarod

I'M A RUNEWARDEN O_O

Eryl

Race hats from Lusternia were the best thing ever, especially since you could customize them.

Kresslack

@Eurice Achaea has this sorta, with Racial Specialisations and Traits. Can roll a Human Savant and then pick up Brilliance as a major trait.

Cooper

You're missing her point. Not all races have a 15 int/dex/str/con option and that you miss 1 stat point no matter what spec/traits you go. Saying you can get 14 + 1 on trait is irrelevant because other races get 15 + 1.

Argwin

I could definitely go for this idea. I originally picked up Atavian because it sounded cool and had innate flying. Since then I've gotten quite attached to being an atavian, but atavian stats are nowhere near efficient for any classes. I've been told repeatedly that I have to either change race for efficiency (and go against established rp) or keep the racial rp and suck it up.

Separating the stats from the race would support rp while allowing people who care about efficiency the opportunity to get the stats they're looking for.

Accipiter

Atavian is great for Serpent, what are you talking about?

Adrik

The thing is, we totally see a number of denizens that go against the status quo with their type of weapons/combat style (Fully armoured knight atavians on Erymanthus, for instance)...

I'm still baffled at how satyrs are a +STR, -CON race... yet have high end regen. They just wanna party hard and party all night...

The only reason I'm a Tash'la at this point is +2 Con is good for everyone, and -1 DEX is practically useless, while -1 INT only affects a very small amount of classes (and max mana). So like. It's just #Good.

Argwin

@Accipiter - I stand corrected. I've clearly missed my calling as a flying thief!

Caelan

INT used to be good for dodging but I dont think I have dodged any attacks in the last 5 years, even with +3 INT and/or using rareminerals. Getting ready to trade in my +3.

Is there any point to have +3 INT anymore unless you are INT monk? Does Avoidance do ANYTHING anymore?

Cooper

Int has never increased dodging.

You'd also be insane to trade it in because it increases damage for most classes, resistances for some, and increases max mana.

Sheverad

You'd also be insane to trade it in because it increases damage for most classes, resistances for some, and increases max mana.

The question is, if you have not much need for the damage boost by INT for PvP, then it comes down to resistance boosts.

In that case, would 2-3 points of INT for your "magical armor" be better spent on CON instead for more "effective health"?

Saonji

I feel like Caelan meant to say Dex, not int.

Caelan

Yeah my bad. Confused INT and Dex there. wow. Brainfart. It has veen a week, people. My bad. Thanks I DID mean DEX. I had just read INT and realized I had veen meaning to ask (byt about DEX).

Also, now on the INT side, I have Sentinel, DWC Runie, DW, Psion, Drsgon, and Monk. Havent they kind of gutted the majority of damage? I know Sentinel maul seems to do just about nothing and I havent played enough to really test the way it has all changed. i know monk BBT damages out, Runie DSB relies more on internal dmg, no?

Accipiter

As far as I know in the current environment, unless you are a serpent Dex is useless. Even more so with weaponry being giving for free now. There are a couple of class leads that indicate a rework of it is planned but if that is worth holding on to 1666 credits that are doing nothing is up to you.

Amranu

+3 dex is fairly noticeable against Monk. Also fairly noticeable against knight classes if they have clumsiness. Unsure to what extent if any it affects other classes though. Still feels worth it to make clumsiness actually do something against 2h.

Caelan

wow how ridiculous is that, then?

So a 2500cr artie to make a single aff more effective? wtf. OI! Maul is useless for me, so my knuckles are pointless too unless I start using monk. So glad I stopped spending on Achaea (save the small bundle I am kicking myself for buying to complete Invasion sets because they eon't put it in the damn shop - couple hundred in a year vs a few thousand means I can put that 450hp 302 in my car though. Far more rewarding)

Thanks for the info for someone who has forgotten all the stuff. Also apologies for hijacking, and in a not-related thread.

Cooper

Dex is more useful than what Amranu mentioned.

You also don't buy dex for the avoidance, you buy it as a serpent to increase your bashing speed and to allow you to be more tanky. Serpents always have to get at least 15-16 dex meaning they sacrifice con. +3 dex artie is equal to +3 con to a serpent since you can then spec for con instead of dex, and buy a regular con artie on top of that.

Kog

Dexterity is also tricky to balance, I suspect- it's the stat that can reduce incoming afflictions/limb damage. If dodge/avoidance works too well, it's pretty crippling...I don't know how I was supposed to get anywhere with forged longsword against a high dex serpent doing SnB, because I was missing three hits in a row pretty regularly.

Namino

Dexterity's usefulness outside of serpent isn't dictated by you, however. It's dictated by your opponent.

At some point in the past, the design crew decided that RNG dodging was an annoying wildcard that made it difficult to balance combat around. So they eliminated the problem by making it so newer classes cannot be dodged -- they can miss while clumsy, but just outright dodging them is impossible. Some legacy classes (serpent for example) were updated to keep them in step with this change, while other classes (DWC) were not altered and can still struggle to hit very dodgy targets.

The worst offender is tekura monk, who can't hit the broad side of a barn. I suspect the class is entirely bugged, as denizens continue to dodge me (Geh'shya and Mhunna just dance on me), despite this having been patched out ages ago. Recent classlead cycles asked for fixes to this to make the class more reliable, but it's still odd.

tl;dr: Dexterity being impactful to combat has to do exclusively with if your opponent is running an old school offense.

Aegoth

I wish monks missed even half as often as you claim

Archaeon

:)    

Draqoom

@Aegoth

I do too, because then we'd miss half as much. Tekura misses a lot, even with the accuracy artie.

It might be against serpents, jesters and bards that we hit something like 1/8 shots, and that's before clumsiness is involved, but comparitively when I do the same thing as a dual blunt Runie or as a serpent the difference is night and day.

Saonji

@Aegoth It does. Just not versus any class you play, lol. I've watched Namino miss 2/3 - 3/3 of his combo hits 3 bals in a row before vs Archaeon, and that's not even the worst RNG he's had.

Monk is also still the only combo-based class that can miss their entire combo due to clumsy, compared to other classes only missing the first hit. When I fought Davok the other day as Shikudo, it took literally twice as long as it takes me to prep anyone else, because clumsy kept absolutely fucking me.