Patch Notes: Version 1.88

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========== Dark Age of Camelot 1.88 Release Notes Archery and Bounty Reward Notes March 28, 2007

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========== VERSION 1.88 INTRODUCTION

This version reveals a startling progression to the story campaign for A Dragon’s Revenge. Players who are interested in participating in A Dragon’s Revenge should be sure and stop by one of these towns: Ludlow in Albion, Vasudheim in Midgard and Ardee in Hibernia. You may be surprised by what you discover! Also, to get caught up and learn more about this campaign, be sure and stop by your realm’s capital city to talk to one of the Dragon Sages: Lailen in Midgard, Pondar Cully in Albion, and Harris MacCullogh in Hibernia.

As part of our long term development effort to keep Dark Age of Camelot the premier Realm vs. Realm game in the MMO market, we have continued to focus on class balance, with this version having a special emphasis on class mechanics for our three archer classes. These changes provide much more versatility to the archer classes. In addition, the change in mechanics allows our development team to respond much more quickly and efficiently to issues as they occur, rather than requiring server downtime for solutions. All changes that have been made to the Archery system are detailed below in the CLASS CHANGES AND FIXES section. We will closely monitor our three archer classes in the coming weeks in order to make necessary adjustments based on observations and the highly valued feedback of our player community.

Note: Due to the changes to archery, all three archer classes (Hunter, Ranger and Scout) have been given forced Realm Ability and Specialization Skill respecs. All archers will need to visit their class trainers to retrain.

In these notes you also will find enhancements to Bounty Point Rewards, newly clustered lands, new sounds and effects, and game compatibility changes for our Vista users.

More to come: With version 1.89, we will launch our first major Frontiers revamp since the release of New Frontiers in June, 2004. This revamp is a two-phase process, at first affecting only the Battleground zones, to give players a preview of the larger changes planned for New Frontiers with version 1.90, and to allow real playability feedback to have an influence on the development process. The Camelot team has been hard at work creating upgraded keep, tower and bridge models as well as developing new and improved siege weaponry - all of which will be a part of this two-phase release. These changes will also greatly improve line of sight issues present in some of the current New Frontiers structures and terrain.

In 1.87 we announced all characters would receive Mythic respecs with each future Live version. To that end, we have awarded all players with a Mythic respec for this version. Players interested in taking advantage of this full respec should visit their class trainers to do so.

NEW THINGS AND BUG FIXES

- The Classic and Shrouded Isles zones have been clustered on all existing clustered servers.

- The Ruins of Atlantis zones have been clustered on all existing clustered servers (Ruinerar av Atlantis in Midgard and Scrios de Atlantis in Hibernia).

- Monsters, pets and Non-Player Characters (NPCs) will now halt their pursuit when the character being chased stealths.

- Maulers will no longer lose Tireless when using a Realm Respec.

- The default locations for the New Quest start window, the merchant window, and the training window have been updated to prevent the new and old quest windows from being completely hidden by other windows.

- The default camera angle has been adjusted upwards.

- Graphics for the kiln in Ludlow have been updated for Catacombs and newer clients.

- The block rate for PvP combat has been capped at 75%.

- The block rate for PvE combat remains unchanged.

- The block rate for Engage remains unchanged.

- Fixed a bug where accounts which were not eligible for the Elder title could still select it when having high crafting skills.

- Players may no longer log out while affected by the PvP immunity timer received after zoning. Upon attempting to quit, players will receive the message: "You must wait for your PvP immunity to wear off before quitting". The usual logout time of 20 seconds will be added to the time remaining on the character's current PvP immunity. This change applies to all servers.

- The sound that plays at the Mythic splash screen has been updated. Note: You must have your sounds enabled through the Options screen for the sound to be heard.

- Personal Bind Stones, Personal House Recall Stones, and Guild House Recall Stones are now available to all players. The Royal Treasury Clerks have been moved out of the throne room so they can be accessed more easily by players who cannot enter the throne rooms.

- Newly created characters will find a Personal Bind Recall Stone in their packs upon first logging in.

- New weapons have been added as gifts from each class guild obtainable every five levels from levels 10 to 29. Each is awarded only by the primary trainer of each class in the capital cities.

- As Quickness no longer has an affect on Archery, all Quickness and Quickness Cap on bows has been converted to Dexterity and Dexterity Cap, respectively. This will affect any dropped bows already in your inventory, as well as those dropped in the future. Note: This will not affect items created by the Random Object Generator (ROG).

- All of the following bonuses on all items have been converted as follows:

Archery Haste - Archery and Spell Haste Casting Haste - Archery and Casting Haste Arrow Damage - Archery and Spell Damage Spell Damage - Archery and Spell Damage Arrow Range - Archery and Spell Range Spell Range - Archery and Spell Range

NEW BOUNTY POINT REWARDS

The availability of rewards which can be purchased with Bounty Points has been greatly increased. Many of these rewards are designed to reduce much of the need to continue PvEing after reaching 50 for those who would rather focus immediately on RvR.

- Realizing their Atlantean masters are not returning, four sphinxes have traveled to the Hall of Heroes to offer ML credit, ML respecs, ML experience, artifact credit, and artifact scrolls in exchange for stories from the frontiers (represented by bounty points). Credit is obtained by purchasing the tokens they sell, then handing the tokens to them. If a token is purchased for an encounter the player already has credit for, handing the token back to the sphinx will return the Bounty Points spent. Note: These changes will not affect the PvE server.

- Bounty Point Masters have been added to each realm's primary border keep (Castle Sauvage, Svasud Faste, and Druim Ligen). These new NPCs sell a variety of items including: realm respecs, Champion Level respecs, the chestnut horse, hastener speed gems, experience-granting scrolls (in both a 1% and 10% variety), and special new jewelry items.

- The NPCs in each housing market that already sell deeds, porches and consignment merchants now offer the same goods for bounty points as well as gold.

- Merchants have been added to house hookpoint stores which can obtained for free and placed on a house hookpoint to allow the purchase of interior and garden decorations for bounty points as opposed to gold.

- Existing bounty point rewards (i.e. stones, totems, and crystals) now have 20 charges instead of 1. Note that current charges will not be retroactively updated on previously purchased rewards.

NEW FRONTIERS NOTES

- The bonus to Realm Points and Bounty Points that was enabled for Agramon Island in New Frontiers for 1.87 has been removed. The bonus to Realm Points and Bounty Points will now be available in the following New Frontiers zones: Odin's Gate, Emain Macha, and Hadrian's Wall. The bonus amount, 150% or 1.5x, remains the same as it was on Agramon Island.

- The portals that lead to the Battlegrounds in the Demon's Breach will now only allow players who match the level restriction for the particular Battleground to pass through. Example: Balban's Breach has a portal to the Lion's Den Battleground which is for players that are levels 5-9. The Battleground portal will now only allow players level 5-9 to enter the Lion's Den.

- The portals in Balban's Breach and Nergal's Breach to the battlegrounds will no longer check what client is being used. This fixes an issue where these portals required players to be using the Darkness Rising client or higher.

- The in-game map for the Jamtland Mountains has been updated so the dock by Glenlock Faste is in the proper location.

- The three rings that can drop from Chief Mulguk, located in the 'Hills of Claret' battleground, have been changed so they are equipped in the ring slot. This corrects an issue where they were incorrectly identified as wrist slot items.

- An aspiring arborist assisted in alleviating an alignment issue arising in Breifine. This fixes an issue where two trees were occupying the same spot.

- An aquatical architect assisted in alleviating an alignment issue with the aquifer in Breifine. This fixes an issue where two water planes were slightly overlapped, causing the color to be off slightly on the surface of the river.

CLASS CHANGES AND FIXES

Animists

- Animists are now limited to a total of 5 active Fire and Forget (FnF) turrets at any given time. This does not include bombers or controlled pets.

- The hitpoints on Fire and Forget turrets have been increased by 50%.

- Animists will now receive a new ability in their Creeping Baseline at level 29 called “Fungal Potency”. It is only usable in PVE zones, has a 2 second cast time, is non-interruptible and castable while on the move. The effect is a 350 radius pet cast ability that reduces resists against high level monsters. This will enhance the Animist pet's ability to hit high level PVE targets.

- The following Animist bomber spell lines are now no longer bombers and have been converted to normally cast spells.

Creeping Base Line:

Rampant Vines - Root Wisp Inferno - Direct Damage/Debuff

Creeping Spec:

Dancing Flare - Area Effect (AE) Armor Debuff Binding Spirit - Area Effect (AE) Root

Verdant Base Line:

Rejuvenating Spirit - Pet Heal Spirit of Nourishing - Pet Regen

Verdant Spec:

Fortifying Emissary - Short duration absorption (ABS) Buff Essence of the Forest - Long duration absorption (ABS) Buff Woodspirit Seal - Bladeturn

Archery (Hunters, Rangers and Scouts)

- Hunters, Rangers and Scouts have been given a forced realm ability and skill specialization respec, and will need to respec their skills for use with the new Archery system.

- The previous Archery system has been disabled for all primary archer classes. Primary archer classes no longer need to place their bow on their hotbar and click multiple times to load and fire their shots.

- Archers have had their unique bow lines replaced with a new line, called "Archery".

- The Pathfinding skill for Rangers has been merged into Archery, and all of the buffs from that line are now found in the Archery line (available to all Archer classes).

- Self buffs in Beastcraft have been replaced with the self buffs in the Archery Spec.

- New archery abilities are now available under the spells tab, under the Archery list.

- Archery damage and draw time are now affected by the Dexterity skill.

- Archery shots now have different Endurance costs depending upon the shot.

- Archery shot types are as follows:

Standard Shot: Average range, draw time and damage.

Long Shot: Longer range, average draw time and slightly lower damage.

Power Shot: Bypasses and removes Bladeturn, average range, long draw time not affected by Dexterity; higher damage.

Point Blank Shot: Very short range, long draw time and high damage.

Critical Shot: Must be fired from stealth, bypasses all defenses, very high damage, average range and average draw time.

Rapid Fire: Average range, short draw time and low damage.

Fire Shot: Heat damage, long draw time and average range.

Cold Shot: Cold damage, long draw time and average range.

Poison Shot: Body damage Direct Damage/Damage Over Time, long draw time and average range.

Acid Shot: Matter damage Direct Damage/Damage Over Time, long draw time and average range.

Siege Shot: Does damage to objects such as Keep Doors and Siege equipment.

Volley: Ground Targeted Area Effect archery shot, that will hit up to a maximum number of targets. The maximum number of targets is 2 more than the number of the shot. IE: Volley 1 will hit three targets max, and Volley 8 will hit 10 targets max.

- Abilities, bonuses and items that affect spells will now also affect Archery.

- Updated icons, sounds and animations have been integrated into the new archery system.

- Archers will receive three new abilities at specializations 1, 2 and 3 in Archery. These abilities allow the player to choose the damage types of their Archery shots, either Slash, Thrust or Crush.

- Heat, cold, acid and poison arrows will ignore the damage type override of the Archery damage type buffs.

- Archers now receive the Mastery of Concentration Realm Ability.

- The Damage Per Second (DPS) of your bow will have an effect on your damage for archery shots. If the effective DPS of your equipped bow is less than that of your max DPS for the level of archery shot you are using, the damage of your shot will be reduced. Max DPS for a particular level can be found by using this equation: (.3 * level) + 1.2

TRADESKILL NOTES

- Timers for all recipes have been standardized to reduce some inconsistencies, as well as to eliminate many excessively long crafting times. For the vast majority of recipes, this results in a significant decrease in crafting time; anywhere from a few seconds to as much as two minutes, such as in the case of the bulk trinkets.

- The recipes for various "eroding" tinctures have been changed to require Lifebane instead of the ingredients for Lifebane poison.

CAMELOT CLASSIC WORLD NOTES

General - Albion

- The Armorsmiths, Fletchers, and Weaponsmith Masters of Camelot have relocated to 'Shorty' Malone's Inn which is located near the channelers in Camelot square near the forge.

- The Alchemist and Spellcraft Masters of Camelot have relocated to the Magus Shoppus immediately next to 'Shorty' Malone's Inn.

- The Guild of Shadows alchemy table has been relocated to just outside 'Shorty' Malone's Inn.

General - Midgard

- Merchants selling crafting materials have settled their differences and have relocated to the two longhouses just North of the Assembly Hall.

- All tradeskill masters can now be found in either the two longhouses or the smaller building to the north of them.

- The alchemy table behind the Assembly Hall has been relocated to near the forge in this same area.

Quests - General

- Basic Horse - A recent effort by the Kings of each realm to encourage citizens to trade in their old, basic horses for weapons has resulted in a surplus of basic horses taking up space in the royal stables. Players who are at least level 10 can obtain the quest by speaking to the Royal Stable Master.

- The 'Royal Stable Master' NPCs will now respond properly when players inquire about either the [Clockwork] or the [Gemstone Horse].

- Imperiled Wizard - Players who have completed step 2 but not finished the quest and received their reward will now get a reminder in their journal on what to say to Master Narudos to finish the quest.

- Reports - The quest reward items 'Avalon's Defense' and 'Avalon's Fortification', which are available for Maulers, have been changed; the bonus to parry was removed and a bonus to Aura Manipulation was put in its place.

Quests - Midgard

- Blodfelag Inquiry - The item reward 'Protector's Pendant of Fortitude' will now reflect the proper Matter Resistance Bonus of 2%.

- Ragnarok Now - The item 'Stolen Texts' has been renamed to 'Stolen Books' to match the description given by NPCs and the quest journal.

Albion Monsters

- Golestandt will now spawn more frequently and with more reliability.

- Large ants have sworn off their diet of snakes meaning they no longer will have a chance to drop snake meat as loot.

- The Royal Treasury Clerk, previously located in the Albion Throne Room, can now be found in the Hall of Fellows in Camelot.

Midgard Monsters

- Gjalpinulva will now spawn more frequently and with more reliability.

- Classic werewolf models have received an art and equipment upgrade. Note: white werewolf and Drakulv models are still using Classic models at this time.

- The Royal Treasury Clerk, previously located in the Midgard Throne Room, can now be found in the Assembly Hall in Jordheim.

- The realm guard 'Dilanna the Chosen of Hel' will now respond to the /where command properly as is her duty.

Hibernia Monsters

- Cuuldurach the Glimmer King will now spawn more frequently and with more reliability.

- The Royal Treasury Clerk, previously located in the Hibernian Throne Room, can now be found in Alainn Cuir in Tir Na Nog.

Item Notes

- The item 'Recruit's Axe' will now properly display as a one-handed axe when equipped and in combat.

SHROUDED ISLES WORLD NOTES

Midgard Monsters

- The monsters named 'hrimthursa icetouch' will now no longer drop realm inappropriate items.

TRIALS OF ATLANTIS WORLD NOTES

Oceanus Encounters

- Sharks will no longer gather in a massive feeding frenzy in the middle of Oceanus Anatole.

- The scrolls for the artifact 'Gem of Lost Memories' will now drop more frequently. This brings these scrolls up to the same drop rate standards as the rest of the artifact scrolls.

Stygia Encounters

- Golden Scarab Vest - Only 25 Scarab Wings are now required to obtain the Magical Scarab-wing Gloves from Tey to pick up the Cursed Scarab-wing Vest. If a player has already turned in 25 or more wings, but has not yet met the previous goal of 50, the player need only turn in one more wing to obtain the gloves.

- Golden Scarab Vest - The Cursed Scarab-Wing Vest will now spawn more frequently.

Item Notes

- The personal boats that are available for purchase in the Trials of Atlantis lands now require only one person to operate. They will now always move at full speed regardless of the number of passengers. In addition, the cost to purchase these items has been reduced dramatically. This includes the skiff used in all realms and the following realm-specific boats: British Cog, Viking Longship, and Elvish Caravel.

- Legendary bows will now grant a damage type buff when equipped to change the damage type of your non-magical archery shots. Note that the mundane damage type buffs (Blunt Arrows, Thrusting Arrows, Slashing Arrows) will overwrite these buffs, in which case you may re-equip the bow to re-apply the buff.

- The studded versions of the Guard of Valor in Albion and Midgard now have the same bonuses to Spell Duration and Range that the Hibernian Reinforced version has.

- Braggart's Bow - The "Arrows of Flight" spell which summoned magical arrows has been replaced with "Eye of Predation" which grants a 5% bonus to range and resist piercing that lasts five minutes. The "Arrows of Flame" spell which granted a 45 second chance to proc a 75 damage Area-Effect Direct Damage has been replaced with a permanent chance to proc a single target version of the same 75 damage Direct Damage.

- Laodameia's Bow - The "Arrows of Atlantis" spell which summoned magical arrows has been replaced with "Eye of Predation" which grants a 5% bonus to range and resist piercing that lasts five minutes.

- Fool's Bow - The "Thunderous Impact" spell which did extra siege damage to objects has been replaced with "Eye of Predation" which grants a 5% bonus to range and resist piercing that lasts 5 minutes.

- Mariasha's Sharkskin Gloves - The "Arrows of Power" spell which summoned magical arrows has been replaced with "Eye of Predation" which grants a 5% bonus to range and resist piercing that lasts five minutes.

CATACOMBS WORLD NOTES

- People Lost - The directions given by the item 'Vudi's Map' and in the player journal for this quest have been clarified to make locating the quest monsters easier.

Instanced Adventuring

- Aurulite values have been increased by at least double.

Old Values:

Aurulite Chip, Value 1 Aurulite Fragment, Value 5 Aurulite Shard, Value 10 Aurulite Cluster, Value 15 Aurulite Cluster, Value 20

New Values:

Aurulite Chip, Value 5 Aurulite Fragment, Value 10 Aurulite Shard, Value 20 Aurulite Cluster, Value 30 Aurulite Cluster, Value 40

Note: These changes are not retroactive and only apply to newly-dropped Aurulite.

- The in-game map for the adventure wing 'The Forgotten Vein' has been updated so the Entrance and Exit marks are in the proper locations.

Dungeons

- The Kobold leader Vanjorndor in Nyttheim now has a chance to properly drop an item along with coin for its loot.

Item Notes

- Hibernian Darkspire Jewelery drops have been adjusted from power level 50 to power level 49. This brings their power level in line with the same drops from Albion and Midgard.

DARKNESS RISING WORLD NOTES

Quests - Albion

- My Mother's Lute - This Albion Royal Expedition Task will now reward experience as well as coin.

Item Notes - Albion

- The spells on the Champion Weapons available to Minstrels have been changed to be more appropriate for the Minstrel's role in combat.

Minstrel Dextera Blade:

/use1 - Regeneration of Kings /use2 - Perfectly Balanced or King's Precision

Minstrel Dextera Edge:

/use1 - Regeneration of Kings /use2 - Perfectly Balanced or King's Precision

Upsilon Harp:

/use1 - Replenishment /use2 - King's Precision or King's Shield

LABYRINTH WORLD NOTES

General

- The Obelisks at each entrance have been given all the same teleportation options as the Obelisks in Nurizane's Crossroads, along with the option to port to Nurizane's Crossroads and Nethuni's Sanctuary (the remote room players are ported to if they stay AFK at the entrance for too long).

- Necromancer pets will now be vulnerable to the nexus rift lightning preventing camping of the Obelisk platforms in Nurizane's Crossroads.

- Necromancers in shade form will no longer trigger the timer for the nexus rift lightning preventing camping of the Obelisk platforms in Nurizane's Crossroads. Only when they drop out of shade form will the timer begin.

- Breeder worms and their offspring will no longer report as 'target not in view'.

Item Notes - The items named 'Icy Rock Paralyzer' have been set so they cannot be emblemized as they are too small to properly hold an emblem.

Quests - Albion

- Unraveling: Illusions of Grandeur - The 'Signaling Whistle' used in this quest can now be used in shade form.

Quests - Hibernia

- Unraveling: Crush the Alliance - The quest will no longer display the message 'This is not the proper time to drop the Korazh Insignia' in addition to the correct message when players use the Korazh Insignia in the proper area.

COOPERATIVE SERVER

- Royal Expedition Tasks 'Den Again', 'Beeches of Braemar', and 'Fighting in the Battlegrounds' will no longer be given out for each realm on the PVP and PVE rulesets as they require a trip to the Battlegrounds which are not enabled on these rulesets.

PVP SERVER

- Royal Expedition Tasks 'Den Again', 'Beeches of Braemar', and 'Fighting in the Battlegrounds' will no longer be given out for each realm on the PVP and PVE rulesets as they require a trip to the Battlegrounds which are not enabled on these rulesets.

- The merchants and scholars within the Ruins of Atlantis zone have banded their magic together to make the area a safe haven for all adventurers to gather and purvey their wares. Like the Capital Cities, Housing, and a number of dungeons, the Ruins of Atlantis zone is now considered a safe zone where players cannot attack one another. This will facilitate players who need to visit the Hall of Heroes, train in the Ruins outside, or gather before they venture forth to attempt the Trials of Atlantis.

GAME CLIENT CHANGES FOR VISTA COMPATIBILITY

In order to make Dark Age of Camelot Vista compatible, all files that the game client generates are now written to a user directory. By default, each user on Vista is a Standard User and only has limited access control. A Standard User does not have permissions to write to common locations, such as the root directory of the game. Therefore, we have made a few changes to the way the game handles files it generates in order to make DAOC fully Vista compatible. The changes affect everyone, not just Vista users. Read on:

Two folders will be created. One folder will be for storing files that the user can easily access such as screen shots and log files. The second is for storing user settings and character settings that do not require direct access by the user.

Folder 1 – for screen shots and log files:

Windows XP, Windows 98 and Windows 98 Second Edition:

Documents and SettingsMy DocumentsElectronic ArtsDark Age of Camelot

Vista:

UsersMy DocumentsElectronic ArtsDark Age of Camelot

Folder 2 – for user settings and character settings:

Windows XP, Windows 98 and Windows 98 Second Edition:

C:Documents and Settings(User)Application DataElectronic ArtsDark Age of Camelot

Vista:

C:Users(User)AppDataRoamingElectronic ArtsDark Age of Camelot

No one should fear losing any user settings or individual character settings. The game will take care of copying all of the affected files to the new folder location.

Files that will be automatically copied from the current location into the new folder: (character name)-(Server).ini (character name)-(Server).ign user.dat

You must login as each character in order to have each character .ini and .ign copy to the new folder location.

Note: The “Application Data” folder for XP and earlier, and the “AppData” folder for Vista, are hidden folders.

When you navigate there, you will have to set your “display hidden files” under Folder Options in order to find it. (Go to C:Documents and Settings(whatever your user name is) - click "Tools" - click "Folder Options" - click the "View" tab - scroll until you see "Hidden files and folders" - click the radio button that says "Show hidden files and folders" - click "Apply" - click "OK.")

Log files and screen shots will not be moved, but new versions will appear in the new folder as they are created.