Patch: June 28, 4am PDT

Patch message is here.

Patch: June 16, 5am PDT

Update Message - June 16, 2006

- Fixed a crash while trying to search the bazaar when not using the default UI.
- Fixed the problem with AA experience being reset when you enter monster missions or use a shroud.
- Fixed a bug with some tasks not being available to be given out to players.
- The ‘;’ chat commands should now work again.
- Setting a chat window's default channel to a chat channel (instead of say, group, raid, ...) will now broadcast the chat to that channel.
- Fixed a problem that was causing the Concentration AA to not function properly.
- We've reverted the fix to channeling made with the last patch. After much discussion, our general feeling is that channeling has been broken for long enough that players have come to rely on that broken behavior as expected gameplay. For the time being, we've reverted back to that broken behavior and will address spell interrupts in general at a later date.

New Hot Zone Itemization - June 2006

I hope that everyone is enjoying the new Hot Zones released with the update this week. Now that the first players to hit the zones have had a few days to run through the content I wanted to discuss what some of you have already noticed, namely that there are some new items dropping in each of the Hot Zones.

This is something that we've wanted to do for some time now. I very nearly was able to itemize the Hot Zones that went live when PoR came out but we just weren't able to complete the items before that set of zones went live. Rather than tack on the items partway through the Hot Zone period I decided to hold off until we released the next set of items. This is not by any means a complete re-itemization of these zones and does not mean they were "revamped" in any way. New items were simply added to the zones in a variety of ways that I will discuss below.

The first and most obvious source of items in the new zones are the new named NPCs to be found in all of the Hot Zones. Some zones have more new named npcs than others but each zone should have at least one new npc. These NPCs have brand new drops that should be a bit more level appropriate for current day EverQuest than some of the items that might drop elsewhere in the zone and are older.

The second source of items are global rare items. A number of the Hot Zones have new global rares. In some zones nearly any NPC can drop these items. In other zones the global rares are restricted by race so only certain types of NPCs drop these items.

The final loot mechanism I used in the Hot Zones is something new I came up with for these zones - feedback is welcome! I did something I call the "Call for Help" mechanic. Basically it works like this....

Some (not all!) npcs in the Hot Zones will, during combat, realize they are in trouble and are not going to win. If they decide to call for help at this point a new NPC will spawn somewhere nearby. This NPC will be the same race as what you're fighting but will be just a little bit stronger. This new NPC will then run over and, well, start hitting you. Obviously a new NPC hitting you isn't fun so the up side to this is that the new NPC is a Named npc with loot that essentially spawned just for you and your group.

The chance of this happening is about the same as the chance to get one of the global rare drops found in the Hot Zones.

I'm hoping that this will add a bit of excitement and danger to normal experience grinding while offering a chance at some nice items in the process.

I hope you all enjoy the items and the zones in this set of Hot Zones.

- Nodyin, EQ Designer

Full thread is here.

Channeling Changed and to be Changed Back

I posted this in another thread, but will mention it here as well.

We fixed a problem with channeling that was causing it to basically be backwards. If you had no AAs, you channeled through damage 100% of the time and as you got AAs, that decreased. It now scales like it should, and like how it worked in the past, where you start out low, channel more often as you gain channeling skill, and your AAs increase that even further. You're going to see more interrupts than before simply because you are no longer channeling 100% of the time (or close to that if you had AAs that were decreasing it). Your chance to channel is still really high at high levels (it caps at 90%), though, assuming you have maxed channeling skill.

One caveat to this...channeling doesn't apply to being bashed, stunned, or moving. Even with a high channeling skill, if you get bashed, stunned, or moved too far, you're going to lose your spell. That hasn't changed.

Rashere

Thread is here.

Update:

Ok, here's the scoop...

The bug dates back at least a year. For the time being, we're going to re-break channeling, putting it back to where it was before the patch, so you'll channel through damage 100% of the time if you have any channeling skill at all. Rather silly, but at this point its expected gameplay. The only difference from before the patch to after is that channeling AAs won't actively reduce your chance to channel...they just won't do anything at all for the time being.

In the near future, I'm going to take a look at the whole interrupt system and likely make some significant changes to it. At that point we can make channeling actually mean something again as part of the larger interrupt change.

Rashere

Name Reservations for the Combine (Progression) Opening on May 31st

The Combine (Progression Server) will be available on May 31st for all current subscribers to log in and reserve a name for the launch on June 28th. The Combine server will open between 10am and 12pm PDT for name reservations only and will remain open until June 26th. Only one character per account will be allowed.

When the server goes live you will be able to fill all 8 character slots but for the sake of fairness we are limiting the pre-launch naming to a single character per account. Keep in mind that until later expansions are unlocked, Iksar, Frogloks, Vah Shir, beastlords, and berserkers will not be available for character selection.

Naming Server Fact Sheet

Opening: May 31st between 10am and 12pm PDT
Closing: June 26th
Character Limit: Naming will be limited to a single character per account although the live server will allow the full set of 8.
Race Limit: Iksar, Vah Shir, and Froglok are not available.
Class Limit: Berserker and beastlord are not available.

You can get to The Combine to reserve your name once it is available as you would log into any other server on the main Live Server Select screen.

Message Edited by Kytherea on 05-30-2006 05:44 PM

Kytherea ~~wielding a giant hammer & a hairless War Hamster~~
"I'm late, I'm late...."

Original post here.

DirectX 9.0c update on Test and is going Live with the next update

Posted by Grumbuk, EQ Programmer, on 05-22-2006:

This post is just another reminder to folks that we've updated the Test server to use the April release DirectX 9.0c. Note there is a little bit of confusion about which specific version of DX9.0c you need; there happens to be a couple of different versions of DX9.0c and to make a long story short if you aren't sure which specific version of DirectX 9.0c you have installed, please just visit the microsoft DirectX update site to be sure your system is fully up to date. While it's a little confusing to everyone that there are multiple releases of DirectX 9.0c, it is a thankfully simple process to just go to the microsoft site and update automatically (I have no idea why Microsoft didn't update the visible version numbers, sorry).

Please note that with the next update to live servers players will be required to use a version of DirectX released in April or later.

For anyone interested in why we are updating, it is because there have been a good number of bug fixes in DirectX 9 since the version currently in use on Live servers. The latest version also provides some very useful diagnostic tools to help us continue to improve the stability & performance of EverQuest. This is not a significant update to the code; pretty much all that had to change from a code standpoint to support the latest DX was shader API related.

Our compatibility lab spent a lot of time testing all the the permutations of supported hardware (which is a lot of time & hardware) and so far neither QA or the players on Test have reported any problems with the DirectX update. That said, if you want to be certain your system will not have any problems related to the DirectX update when we patch live servers, I recommend you log in to the Test server and verify your system allows you to log in and play with no obvious visual artifacts. To the best of our knowledge, updating DirectX to the latest version will not affect your ability to play on Live servers and in fact we believe a significant portion of the player base is already using the correct version. We are optimistic this will be a smooth update, but it's always good to get more people confirming the results so if you're able to get on Test to check it out please do.

Thanks-

---------------------------
Eric Cosky - "Grumbuk"
Assistant Lead Programmer, EverQuest
Sony Online Entertainment

Full thread here with links to Microsoft for DirectX.

8th Year Veteran Reward Decided

Posted by Oshran, EQ Designer, on 05-22-2006:

Quick announcement: the 8 year veteran reward has been decided! It's called Throne of Heroes and will port 8 year vets directly to the throne room in the guild lobby. ToH will be similar to Origin in regards to its casting and reuse timers. To accommodate this new ability, the guild lobby and its amenities will be made available to everyone, even those who are not yet flagged for Dragons of Norrath.

Looking forward to 8 more,
Oshran

Full thread is here.

Stealth Update 05/03/06 at 4am PST

The following zones were updated early this morning:

Fanning the Flames (Tirranun raid) - The lava spout traps were removed.
Demi-Plane of Blood - Tether added to Mayong Mistmoore.
Deathknell - Ability to feign and stun the tank was removed from the Deathknell Enforcers.
Trakanon's Teeth - Can now launch and enter the Kunark monster mission raid with only one person needing to be flagged.
Hollowshade Moor - The war should be working again.

Let me know if you have any questions.

-Prathun

Full thread is here.

House of Commons Dev Chat - April 27, 2006

Read it here.

Taunt Changes Heading to Test Server

From Rashere, Lead Designer, on April 27, 2006:

I've mentioned this in the past, but have now made the taunt changes in code. They'll be going to test soon and I wanted to let everyone know what changes are being made. The changes are mostly relevant at high levels, where taunt was really a problem, and consist of the following:

Above level 60, taunt will use your taunt skill now instead of being a hard coded success rate. Before these changes, your taunt skill was irrelevant if you were above level 60 and taunting something that was also above level 60. The chance to taunt is roughly the same if you are max skill as it was before the change.

To go along with this, Paladin and Shadowknight now have the same taunt caps as Warriors. Previously, since the taunt chance was hard coded, they were taunting the same anyway so this ensures that the 3 tank classes keep that equality.

The chance to taunt an NPC higher level than yourself dropped off at double the rate if you were above level 60 than if you were below level 60 making it very hard to taunt creature higher level than yourself if you were above level 60. I've removed this check so the drop off happens at the same rate at all levels now instead. This will improve taunt success rates against yellow and some red con NPCs at high levels.

The mininimum chance to successfully taunt an NPC has been increased.

You now gain a bonus to your chance to taunt an NPC that is lower level than yourself with that bonus growing as the level difference increases.

Rashere

Oh, one additional note I probably should have included in the original message.

Changing taunt is what I refer to as a "scary change". It's one of those systems that by itself doesn't do a whole lot, but affects a ton of other aspects of combat. Changes to systems like this have a rippling affect on balance throughout the game and no matter how many tests we run, we just won't see the full impact until its being used on a large scale. The changes I've outlined are what we are anticipating will work best, but I'm expecting we'll be making tweaks over the coming months as we see how it really plays out in true game conditions. When this hits test, I encourage people to log on and try it out as much as they can.

Rashere

Full thread is here.

Redfang Bug to be Fixed

It seems that Redfang will not reset if the raid wipes under certain conditions.

Here is a post by Prathun, EQ Designer, on April 24, 2006:

Well, Redfang would reset if he were up for 10 minutes, but he's only up for 4. Each time he depops to disappear it resets the counter. This is now fixed on Test and Beta. I've stored the depop counter in a different location.

-Prathun

Full thread is here.

Vishtamar Bugged

Vishtamar has a DoT, it's a real tank killer, called Vishtamar's Corruption. Reduces AC by 600, decreases Aggro by 95% and changes max hp total by -75 and lasts for 5 minutes.

It is blocked if you have Steeloak on you.

Post made by Prathun, EQ Designer, on April 24, 2006:

Vishimtar has always had that spell.

I'll check on the stacking and see if it is getting blocked by a buff. At this point, the fight's hard enough without adding in any extra complications. I'd rather just remove the effect than "fix" it and drastically increase the challenge of an already difficult battle.

You know, this kind've reminds me of when we were doing 6th anniversary fabled events. While looking at Venril Sathir, we discovered that he had 2-3 unique detrimental spells created specifically for his fight that he can't cast. They've never worked because they cost mana to use and he doesn't have any.

-Prathun

The full thread on Sony's forum is here.

Traps in Inktu`ta and Fanning the Flames (Tirranun) Bugged

Posted by Prathun, EQ Designer, April 21, 2006:

The traps in Inktu`ta and Fanning the Flames (Tirranun) are making those fights much more difficult than I had intended.
Fixing this will probably simply mean making the traps much easier to disarm. Sorry for the inconvenience and I'll have a look at this as soon as possible.

-Prathun

Posted by Prathun, EQ Designer, April 24, 2006:

For the traps in Inktu`ta, I made them much easier to sense and disarm. You should hardly ever fail against them. Also, they were firing off 2.5x faster than they were originally, so I lowered the frequency of how often they can cast back to what it should have been.

For the traps in the Fanning the Flames instance, I removed them entirely. The new trap system has made it impossible to recreate the effect I was trying for.

This change has not gone live yet.

-Prathun

Full thread is here.

Gift of Magic / Abundant Healing Supposedly Fixed

Here is some reports from Rashere, Lead Designer of EverQuest:

Spell procs, including GM and AH, now work similarly to how normal procs do. The change was to allow all spell procs to continue processing if the first one failed and there are other ones that can still be triggered. It tries one first and if that fails, tries the next until it either runs out of ones to try or one succeeds. Order is based on "greatest effect" like other focus effects. In this case, greatest effect is determined by the chance to proc so one with a high chance to proc takes precedence over one with a lesser chance to proc.

Rashere

Here is the report about it being still broken:

Few things...

First, as others noted, it looks like GM/AH is still not working properly on live servers. I did some checking and it looks like while the data side of the fix is there, the code to support it didn't make it into the patch to live servers. I'm working with the coders to schedule a patch to correct this issue, so hopefully we can get it resolved soon.

Second, the breakdown of AH and GoM proc rates is as follows:

AH (1) - 2%
AH (2) - 4%
AH (3) - 6%
AH (4) - 8%
AH (5) - 10%

GoM (1) - 3%
GoM (2) - 6%
GoM (3) - 10%

Third, like combat procs, you can get a proc from spells, items, and AAs in a single cast...but only one of each. It's possible to proc up to 3 spells on a single cast if you were to proc one from each.

Rashere

More here:

When the chances are the same, it comes down to how they are read into the list. Whichever one is read in first gets processed first. I'm not 100% sure on that order, but its based on how they're stored in your character file. Since AH was blocking GoM before, its likely safe to assume that AH generally gets read in first.

The proc chances are whole numbers only, so I can't make it 10.1 or 9.9. Even with both at max ranks, though, its only a 1% reduction in the proc chance for whichever one is coming second.

Rashere

Update: April 20, 2006

We usually have dozens of code changes going on at any time, so when we want to put something live, it has to be manually added to the live code. In this case, we had a lot of things we didn't want to include because they aren't ready to go out yet and mistakingly missed adding the code part of the spell proc fix to the patch. It's been working on test for a while now...it just didn't get added to the patch to go live. So, I apologize. We know its a big issue for a lot of folks so we're going to patch tonight specifically to add this fix to the live servers.

Regarding the interaction of AH/GoM, while the actual in-game impact of having AH check before GoM is minor, I can understand the psychological implications and am willing to lower AH by a percent across the board to ensure that GoM always checks before AH does. That change won't go out until our next large patch, though.

Rashere

The full thread is here.

Untrackable Mobs?

Certain mobs have been not showing up on track. When players mentioned this, here was the reply -

From Rashere, Lead Designer of EverQuest on April 13, 2006:

"There's a rationale for non-trackable mobs? Personally, I abhor them and fix them whenever I find them. The only things that should be non-trackable, imo, are NPCs you couldn't interact with as a player just so they aren't cluttering up the tracking list. There may be an exception here or there under certain situations, but they should be very, very rare.

I'm generating a list of all NPCs flagged as nontrackable right now. Most of them likely shouldn't be, so will be changed when I'm done."

It somehow got mixed into a thread about the Endless Quiver,
here.

Update: April 19, 2006 -

This didn't make the patch notes, but the majority of NPCs that weren't trackable before should be trackable now.

Rashere

Lorekeeper Blaimas Giving Monster Mission Info

Lorekeeper Blaimas, now in Plane of Knowledge, been exploring Norrath and discovered an exciting collection of experiences that allow you to have an adventure from the perspective of another creature or individual (a Monster Mission) He will provide a list of tasks to hail each mission giver for each currently available Monster Mission. The hail tasks are restricted by the same expansion check as the final missions so if you can get the hail task you should be able to accept the actual Monster Mission.

This NPC was created as a response to a repeated request on Sony Forum for something along these lines to help players locate the mission givers. At this time he doesn't tell you where the mission givers are but he does tell you which zone to look in, which is a start. Nodyin the developer will try to add a description for the locations at some point if he can.

Video Blanking Out or East/West Bug

When this bug occurs you see only sky, particles, and the UI. It often goes in and out as you rotate around, and "blanks" when facing a certain direction, like east or west. They did fix one bug that was causing this in several zones. However, it appears that there is still a remaining bug, so this thread is to get information.

Death on Mounts Due to Auras

As some of you know, with Auras came the risk of death due to a bug if you were on a mount and moving too quickly.

They found the problem with this code, but unfortunately it's too late to get proper testing of the fix before the next update though so for the time being please be careful of using auras and mounts at the same time.

The change is pretty deep in the collision/movement system and they say they've learned to be extremely careful about making last minute changes to these sorts of things. The code is now on the Test server. You can read more about this if you are interested here.

UPDATE: This is allegedly fixed with the patch of April 19, 2006. This blog entry will be removed shortly if this is confirmed.

Line Of Sight Issues

∙ Targeting via clicking with mouse not working even though you are clicking right on it.

∙ Spells that won't cast or land because you are blocked by something that really doesn't seem like it should be blocking.

∙ Combat where you should be able to melee but can't see your target.

Grumbuk-Dev is working on fixing this. You can help by reporting any problems you have here. Please be sure to read his first post so you know what information is needed. Currently, there is no ETA on fixing this.

UPDATE: This is allegedly fixed with the April 19, 2006 patch. This blog entry will be removed shortly if reports agree that it is fixed.

"Find" Command Not Working

They are aware that the Find command fails to work much of the time. This seems to be related to the Pathing problems mentioned here. They expect it will be fixed when Pathing is.