Quarter 3 Is Here

[Tigairius]

Well, it's that time again! We are releasing the 3rd Quarter Update.

Here are some highlights:

Big Worms
Big worms have had a complete overhaul. They have been completely rescripted from scratch and now function more smoothly. You can see the worms moving under the ground now as they come to attack you and they are a bit more intelligent and stronger.
The amount of experience they give has also been increased. Updated the graphics too!

Lords
Lords, like the big worm, have had a complete overhaul as well and have been completely rescripted from scratch. They are more intelligent now and roam around the main map again, enter haunted houses, and dungeons. The Glok lord now casts a spell sometimes when attacking as well, I think you'll find it pretty damaging.

More effects will be added in the future.

Aesthetics
Well, we have certainly concentrated on aesthetics more this update. Aesthetics are very important for GK, so we took some time to lay out some aesthetic-based updates.

Torches
The main wooden torches have been remade again to use particles completely and no images (unless you have particles disabled).
You can use older versions of the torch by disabling particle effects.

Windmill
The blades of the windmill actually spin now instead of having a 3 frame choppy animation. It is no longer an animation but the spinning is actually script-controlled.

Level Fading
When you enter or exit a level you will notice that you now experience a screen transition.

Player fading
When a player logs in or out and you are watching them, you will no longer just see them appear/disappear. Players will now fade in and fade out.

New Security Measures Have Been Taken
We have added new logging methods in order to ensure your security on GK further from scammers and hackers. For security purposes, I won't elaborate further.

Your Inventory
The inventory has received a bit of an update. You should notice that your inventory will no longer crash when you have a large inventory or have a sack full of items. It has also been improved to fix the bug where some of your items aren't displayed when you open a large sack.

Drastic Changes to the Mudlib
Drastic changes to the MUDLIB have been made in order to provide us with easier and more flexible working procedures. In addition to this update, we are now able to control items better. As a result of this, wands have been fixed so you cannot use a weapon while casting, and potions, scrolls, etc. have been disabled in certain levels (kingdoms core).
Due to this change, pets now also eat the correct amount of food off of the ground when there are stacked foods.

Blessing
Blessing ratios have been shifted to make blessing more difficult in the future. This will increase the value of blessings and make it harder to bless things.

Enchantments
The spawn rate of enchantments such as Enchant Armour, Improve Weapon Damage, etc have been drastically lowered in a preparation to balance out the melee weapon system.

Other Smaller Additions
Other smaller additions have been added, such as the new "/grab" command which allows you to grab people. You may also notice other small changes here and there.
Poison and daggers also no longer knocks back players whenever they get hit by it.
Daggers, axes, etc. should display now while strafing.

[Cubes]

Any new places to level? making lords roam again actually made it harder.

[shrimps]

I like this update the most so far, especially the boost in EXP and lowered spawn rate of the improvement scrolls.
I noticed the worms are still a little buggy, I hope they get fixed soon.
Thanks for updates. =]

[Tigairius]

Originally Posted by shrimps

I noticed the worms are still a little buggy

Should be fixed.

[DustyPorViva]

No xp on monster death?

[MajinDragon]

Love this update, especially about the worms. And the fade in, fade out thing is a nice touch. Hope the inventory can be further updated so that you can expand it so you can organise even a large inventory w/o having to just scroll up.

Finally, Dustari's prize will be revleaed now, hopefully.

[cbk1994]

The effect on the glok lord needs to be changed. It nearly crashed my client, and slowed it to almost a halt (on the new Mac version, which usually runs far better than the Windows one).

[StormYs]

I was hoping to see something done about AC=[ but hey this update ain't to shabby.

[bioboi]

Good update, although I think there's some pretty obvious issues you need to touch on the next update, rather now then later really though.

[Soala]

Nice updates

[cbk1994]

Lords need to be fixed a bit. Right now they're way too hard to find, and they give virtually the same experience and the same drops. This makes questing and leveling off of them impractical, effectively forcing lower level players to use Brutals when lords used to be sufficient. I think a good addition would be to add an icon that shows on the map that indicates where a lord is, similar to the way boats are.

[Birdo13]

Originally Posted by cbk1994

Lords need to be fixed a bit. Right now they're way too hard to find, and they give virtually the same experience and the same drops. This makes questing and leveling off of them impractical, effectively forcing lower level players to use Brutals when lords used to be sufficient. I think a good addition would be to add an icon that shows on the map that indicates where a lord is, similar to the way boats are.

Perhaps they should make it that it will only show the lord on the map when you go and talk to the npc that you trade with. Example, you are looking for the Glok Lord, so you go to the npc that takes glok lord spores and he says "The Glok lord is heading west!, here let me mark it on your map." and it will give a general area / direction that the lord is traveling in on the map for you.
Just an idea

[cbk1994]

Originally Posted by Birdo13

Perhaps they should make it that it will only show the lord on the map when you go and talk to the npc that you trade with. Example, you are looking for the Glok Lord, so you go to the npc that takes glok lord spores and he says "The Glok lord is heading west!, here let me mark it on your map." and it will give a general area / direction that the lord is traveling in on the map for you.
Just an idea

What about leveling, though?

Plus, when questing, you generally (or used to) run around the map a few times gathering up a stockpile of lord parts so you don't have to go find a lord every time you talk to someone. It speeds up questing a lot.

[Stephen]

Originally Posted by cbk1994

Lords need to be fixed a bit. Right now they're way too hard to find, and they give virtually the same experience and the same drops. This makes questing and leveling off of them impractical, effectively forcing lower level players to use Brutals when lords used to be sufficient

As a side point I would like to remind players that this is a return of functionality - not a new feature. Lords used to travel the map, but broke due to poor coding and maintenance by previous administrations. However, with that said - Tigairius and I will be modifying and tweaking all updated systems until we find the "happy point".

Originally Posted by cbk1994

I think a good addition would be to add an icon that shows on the map that indicates where a lord is, similar to the way boats are.

While I'm entirely unprepared to indicate the precise position of any quest element or lord, Tigairius and I will discuss the idea of a more generalized position indicator.

[MajinDragon]

Originally Posted by Stephen

As a side point I would like to remind players that this is a return of functionality - not a new feature. Lords used to travel the map, but broke due to poor coding and maintenance by previous administrations. However, with that said - Tigairius and I will be modifying and tweaking all updated systems until we find the "happy point".


While I'm entirely unprepared to indicate the precise position of any quest element or lord, Tigairius and I will discuss the idea of a more generalized position indicator.

Solution to the difficulty in finding the lords: When one visits the npc's which speak about the specific lord locations, a marker is set on that players map writing either BomyL, GlokL etc. Lords still have to be found, but with experience lord hunting can be made alot easier than just running around aimlessly, as if hunting for one of those escort npc's which simply tell you 'She's somewhere on Main Island'.