Publish 56

The following is a list of changes deployed as Publish 56 on October 29, 2008.

Deployment History

  • September 5, 2008 - expected late September or early October 2008.
  • September 19, 2008 - Ever so slightly delayed, now expected early October 2008.
  • September 26, 2008 - Based on a FoF update, expected late October 2008.
  • October 21, 2008 - Published to Test Center shard.
  • October 27, 2008 - Published to Origin shard.
  • October 29, 2008 - Published to all other shards.
  • October 30, 2008 - Update 1 published to all shards.
  • November 6, 2008 - Update 2 published to all shards.
  • November 11, 2008 - Update 3 published to all shards.

New Content

War of Shadows

  • Factions cities will come under attack in Trammel by the forces of the Shadowlords
  • Capturing a town sigil in Felucca allows the Trammel city to be invaded
    • Sigil must be captured by Chaos (Shadowlords or Minax)
    • Up to three towns can be invaded at a time
    • Additional sigil captures will queue those cities for attack, but will not occur until another city’s invasion ends
  • A city’s guard zones will disappear in Trammel when invaded, becoming a warzone
  • All Felucca faction cities will have their guard zones will be removed, becoming warzones
  • Affected cities for the invasion:
    • Britain
    • Skara Brae
    • Magincia
    • Minoc
    • Moonglow
    • Trinsic
    • Vesper
    • Yew
  • Players logging into a town under invasion will be relocated to Jhelom
    • Teleportation attempts into danger zones will be rerouted to Jhelom when possible
  • Invading forces comprised of three types
    • Shadowlord allied monsters (new alliances, beyond just daemons)
      • Britain: Dragons
      • Skara Brae: Elementals
      • Magincia: Undead
      • Minoc: Plague
      • Moonglow: Void
      • Trinsic: Orcs
      • Vesper: Rogue Ophidians
      • Yew: Daemons
    • Army of Shadows (Humans and Elves)
      • Ranking and promotion system similar to the Ophidian Invasion
      • Four basic types
        • Warrior
        • Ranger
        • Mage
        • Healer
      • Ranks
        • Recruit
        • Scout
        • Corporal
        • Lieutenant
        • Captain
        • General
    • Corrupted townspeople
      • Hatred
        • NPCs aggressively attack players and other NPCs
      • Falsehood
        • NPCs attempt to steal from players
        • Each NPC can only steal one item, normal theft checks apply
        • Item is returned to the player if the NPC dies or is purified when the invasion ends (player must be in the city)
      • Cowardice
        • NPCs flee from players
  • Invasion of a town ends when the sigil is recaptured by Order (TB or CoM), or the local invasion is completely defeated
  • Loot
    • All invasion monsters and army members drop faction silver
      • 1 to 5 normally, up to 25 for special mobs like the Shadow Knight
      • Silver is multiplied by rank within the army
      • Rare bonuses possible
    • All invasion monsters have at least double the normal loot
    • Army members drop special weapons and spellbooks with properties based on their rank
    • Army members drop exceptional loot at higher ranks
  • Crimson Dragons introduced as allies to the Shadowlords, appear as the final stage in the invasion. Shares similar loot to “The Six,” such as Myxkion
  • Platinum Dragons introduced as allies to Britannia, enemies of the Crimsons
    • Both dragon races are intelligent, and cause all dragons to go wild in their presence
  • Siege Perilous and Mugen will have all the content available, but will have the invasion proceed in Felucca

Factions

  • Added new equippables and consumables
  • Added a community collection chest inside each stronghold to collect silver, and give faction equippables and consumables as rewards
    • Donated silver will be tied to the faction system at a later date
  • Sigil corruption time dropped to 4 hours (from 10 hours) for the duration of the event
  • Sigil purification time dropped to 6 hours (from 3 days) for the duration of the event
  • Faction Thieves will now receive 100 silver and 10 kill points for successfully capturing a town sigil
    • Sigil must complete full circuit of corruption: from town pedestal, to stronghold, back to town pedestal
    • Interruptions will not count against the original thief, as long as the original thief’s faction finishes the corruption process
    • Thieves must be online to receive their reward
  • Killing faction enemies inside warzones results in bonus kill-points and silver

Halloween

  • New quest starting in the Yew Courthouse: talk to Jasper and read the book on the table
    • Can be done completely in either Felucca or Trammel
    • Every step required in the chain, skipping steps will keep you from completing the event
    • Event can be done once per character
    • Participating characters must be 15 days old (except for Test Center)
    • Khaldun temporarily available in Trammel for the duration of the event
      • Shadow Fiend of the Unseen now perfom the life drain attack
      • General increases to HP and stats for Khaldun creatures
      • Slightly increased the spawn rate of Shadowfiends, Spectral Armors, and Zealots
      • Note: Shadow fiends and Spectral Armor drop loot onto the ground instead of leaving a body
      • Note: Players cannot resurrect inside Khaldun
  • New Trick or Treating rewards

Old Magincia

  • Three new quests to help heal the land by releasing the spirits trapped in Magincia’s ruins
    • The quest giver is a mage near the Magincia moongate
    • Quest rewards are three types of rubble, one for each quest (total of 12 pieces)
    • Rubble rewards are all unique - they do not overlap craftables or Magincia Invasion rubble. You can see the possible rewards in the quest gump.
    • Quests are non-repeatable
  • Three types of ghosts now reside in Magincia
    • Restless Souls
      • Invulnerable, unmoving
      • Notices player movements
      • Can be released by using Spirit Speak nearby
        • Drops Threads of Life
    • Forsaken Souls
      • Constantly wanders the streets of Magincia
      • Can be released by casting Exorcism nearby
        • Drops Threads of Thought
    • Corrupted Souls
      • Red, aggressive
      • Calls other Corrupted Souls nearby for help when attacking
      • Can only be released by being killed
        • Drops Threads of Fate

Fixes/Changes

Combat

  • Disarm will no longer affect shields
  • Hiryus will only use the dismount special attack on mounted players
  • Killing Solens with a pet will properly remove friendship with the nest (Update: this chance has been reverted)
  • Ranged attacks on slimes will no longer cause acid damage to your weapon
  • Successfully taming an aggressive animal will stop its attack
  • Tamers can no longer aggro with their pets and stay hidden
  • Mounts under the effect of Nerve Strike will not be able to be mounted
  • Wandering healers will no longer attack players who drink a refresh potion
  • Wraith Form will not lose pass-through ability when crossing server boundaries

Blessing/Insurance

  • Blackrock of all sizes can now be insured
  • Blessed items will remain blessed after being traded
  • Public trash cans will no longer accept blessed items. This does not affect personal trash cans in your home.

Crafting

  • Crafting with Dull Copper will no longer exceed the 255 durability cap
  • Skullcaps can now be crafted with a higher durability than 12

Display Issues

  • Granite will now display the color of the granite on mouse-over, rather than just saying “granite.”
  • Guild abbreviations can no longer be made to imitate Faction abbreviations (Min, CoM, TB, SL)
  • Player crafted Parasitic Poison will display its name correctly, instead of “Deadly Poison”
  • Pet summoning ball will no longer give an error message when crossing subserver boundaries
  • Plants will no longer mystically say “I’m here” when they reach a specific stage of growth
  • Savage Kin Paint effect will remain visible even after logging out and back in
  • Quivers will no longer lose their color on server startup

Factions

  • Faction members in the Hero/Evil system on Siege Perilous and Mugen will no longer be able to grief their teammates by causing them to lose kill-points when auto-defending
  • Faction vendors from the losing faction will now disappear from a conquered city
  • Non-faction players cannot block the entrances to the Shadowlord and Minax strongholds
    • Shadowlord entrance area can no longer be teleported into, repels non-factioners
    • Minax stronghold boundaries have been extended to the entire mountain pass, and the recruiting stone placed outside the mountain
  • The bridge and outer entrance to the True Britannian stronghold can no longer be trapped

Housing/House-Addons

  • Secured bags can no longer be dyed by anyone in a public house
  • Spinning Wheels will no longer be lost if re-deeded while in use

Resources

  • Blank scrolls can be added to commodity deeds
  • Empty bottles can now be added to commodity deeds
  • Gargoyle Pickaxe will now dig up dull copper ore

Spawning

Stacking

Test Center

  • Test Center welcome window reflects Publish 56
  • New test center command: “give seeds”
    • Gives the player a bag of fertile dirt and various seeds

Quests

  • Abandoned quests should no longer cause the quest to fail in the player’s log
  • Chance to get three new colors of seeds in the Naturalist quest for the Flowery Cactus: fire, white, and black
  • Cooking quests will now accept all types of flour
  • Escort NPCs will now properly handle following players onto boats
  • Ocllo has been removed from the Escort Quest list
    • This will not interfere with escort quests in New Haven

Vendors

  • Instituted a new Vending Penalty for players who attempt to circumvent the daily vendor charge for their items
    • Vending Penalty is the same as the daily charge for the item
    • Penalty is applied if the item is removed by the owner before 24 hours has passed since it was added to the vendor
    • Penalty is noted on the object as an item property
    • If the item is added to a vendor again, the vending penalty is automatically deducted from that vendor’s account, or given back to the player if funds are insufficient
    • There is a 30 minute grace period after adding an item to a vendor to prevent accidents: any item removed before 30 minutes passes will not have a vending penalty
    • Once 24 hours pass, the item may be removed at any time by the owner without penalty. Re-adding it to the vendor starts the process over again, however
  • Added commas to vendor prices

Misc

  • A tamed sheep can only be shorn by the owner
  • A tamed cow can only be milked by the owner
  • All bows can now be used on Archery Buttes
  • Animal Lore can now be used on morphed Imprisoned Dogs
  • Begging will properly give the player gold when the message states they should have received some
  • Books should now copy properly from one size (in pages) to another
  • Casting a spell on an invalid location will no longer consume reagents or cause skill gain
  • Cows will replenish their milk supply 24 hours after being exhausted
  • Fire Beetles will no longer work as a forge when ghosts
  • Fixed a macro to equip last weapon while meditating
  • Full suits of Virtue Armor no longer lose Self Repair on server startup
  • Gems from the Gem Cart can no longer be used to recharge a communication crystal
  • Ghosts can no longer remove runes from runebooks
  • Left-facing War Forks can now be sold to vendors
  • Morphed forms will now check for the correct skill and skill amount
    • Banking skill in a Soulstone will check your resultant skill level, and return you to normal if you can no longer maintain your morphed form
    • Casting from a scroll will return you to normal in three minutes
  • Plants can have resources added to them after the seventh stage, without having to unlock and relock them
  • Players may now join the Thieves’ guild one week after character creation, and be removed one week after requesting to quit
    • This was previously tied to one week (each way) of actual gameplay
  • Public trash cans are no longer magically locked
  • Players will no longer be able to move while using the “Help/Stuck” option as a ghost
  • Weapon Switch macro will work properly with spellbooks
  • Young players will now get the proper warning when entering Ilshenar dungeons

Updates

Update 1

On October 30, 2008, the following was published:

  • Forsaken Souls in Magincia will now die when the exorcism spell is used on them.
  • Fixed an issue with Inscription, being able to copy the books in Khaldun
  • The Dark Guardian the Keeper of Knowledge will not call guards when players try to talk to him
  • The Skeletal Lich will now only move in a limited area
  • Halloween candy will not make you full
  • Fixed the “Blessed” faction equippables
    • Can only be equipped by owner but can now be looted.
  • Fixed an issue with being able to recall into war zones in Felucca
  • The Halloween event will end on Nov. 17th
  • Trick or Treating will end also on the 17th of Nov.
  • Fixed the issue with the Elwood's The Collector's Quest NPC disappearing on Siege.
  • Fixed an issue with where the Skeletal Lich was spawning in bad locations
  • Siege Perilous cost for faction items will cost 5 times as much
  • Fixed bug with flax plant not able to be tended when locked down
  • Reverted a change to solen hive loyalty that was causing unexpected loss of friendship status
  • Skeletal Liches will no longer be attacked by guards
  • Fixed some issues with instanced corpses on the Crimson Dragons

Update 2

On November 6, 2008, the following was published:

  • Halloween 2008
    • Increased the number of drones that spawn
    • Lowered the cocoons’ respawn timer from 5 minutes to 3 minutes
    • Adjusted the drop rate of gossamer and small spider webs
    • Gossamer will now appear in the player’s bag if they are among the top damagers. They will receive a random number between 1 and 4
    • Rereading the journal can no longer be abused to reset the quest by circumventing the normal flow
  • Factions and War of Shadows
    • Fixed an issue with Factions Elections not working properly on some shards
    • Implemented a Town Crier update system for the War of Shadows. Saying “news” to a Town Crier or Sherry the Mouse statue will list one of the towns under attack
    • Fixed issue with global Town Crier updates not being sent to Trammel from Felucca, and vice versa
    • Increased number of Lieutenants, Captains, and Generals and adjusted their hit-points per rank
    • Increased the DI and SDI on weapon rewards by five points across the board
    • Added bonus to kill-points and silver for killing enemies of a different side
      • Order: TB and CoM
      • Chaos: Minax and SL
      • Example: If an "Order" faction member kills a "Chaos" member, they receive 2x kill-points, and 2x silver
      • Example: If an "Order" faction member kills an "Order" member, they receive the normal points and silver
      • This effect stacks in “warzones” in Felucca (any of the eight faction cities)
        • Kill-points can be up to 3x, silver up to 4x
        • Bonus kill-points are not deducted from the victim, they’re just a bonus given to the victor
    • Town sigils will now properly teleport back to their pedestals when a town is "neutralized" as part of the invasion
    • Fixed the no spell casting area in Moonglow
  • General
    • Fixed the issue where players were getting power scrolls in Ilshenar

Update 3

On November 11, 2008 an update to Publish 56 was made to all shards to fix a bug with Sherry the Mouse statuettes causing the Origin shard to crash repeatedly.

See Also