Dark Age Of Camelot: It's A Bird, It's A Plane, It's A Very Late Posting of the Grab Bag!

Taken from here.

Q: What happened to the "Style Review" I kept hearing about in team lead reports?

A: We've decided that it makes more sense to look at styles in context with each patch, instead of constantly putting the issues off until a "Style Review." Instead of waiting for some mythical (no pun intended) future date that keeps getting pushed back, we're going to try and provide answers to the team lead reports as we get them.

This is a change from what's been said in the past, I know. I hope you guys can understand that Mythic has been shuffling employees around, and different people now have new responsibilities and new ideas. Some change was inevitable. This particular call was made awhile ago, but we wanted to talk to the team leads about it first since they were the most affected by our change in plans.

Some people on the forums seem to feel that this means we will not be looking at styles at all. This is just not true. Next week, we are planning to show some proposals to our team leads, and you'll start seeing those notes in 1.70. I'm not saying it'll fix every style issue ever MENTIONED, but it's the start of real results gleaned from discussions. Better to begin now than to wait!

Other people have asked what's been going on with styles for the last bunch of months. The things we finished, you've seen in patch notes. Behind the scenes, someone has been working with a spreadsheet for quite some time. I know some have expressed concern about their time being wasted - again, those discussions are leading to results, even if the results won't come dramatically all at once. There's no such thing as wasted discussion if it leads to better understanding.

I've seen a number of our testers and players out in public forums arguing that an annual "Review with a capital R" was a bad concept (not to mention making a simple process sound a lot bigger than it was), and that they were only looking forward to it because they thought it was their only chance for this or that issue. Ultimately, we agreed that it didn't make sense. The system as it was, was not working and was putting off needed change for far too long. The volunteers shouldn't have to wait for months to hear answers related to style issues they mention in their reports, and now, they won't.

Q: I don't like my (insert artifact here), and I noticed in the patch notes that you have set up an NPC to trade it in. Well, I handed it to the NPC, and I didn't like what I got back. Was the fact that I didn't get to choose what I got back a bug?

A: There were a number of appeals on this topic today - you need to check the patch notes very carefully. Whatever the note says you'll get back from the NPC is what you'll get - no other options.

Q: Will the /level 30 command still work on Pendragon?

A: Yes!

Q: I noticed the new RA chart doesn't list prerequisites, is this on purpose?

A: Yes. In the quest to simplify the system and make it more fair, we've done away with most prerequisites. With one exception, of course - most "tier two" and "tier three" versions of an ability require the lower level version of the ability as a prerequisite.

Q: My husband has been playing a character on my account when I'm not home, and has fallen in love with the game. We're going to buy him his own account and computer, but can we move his character off my account to his?

A: This is certainly one of the most popular questions I get. Every so often, I post it here, and I tell people that while we don't have that option right now, I appreciate their feedback and keep track of how many requests we get for it.

This time? All I'm going to say is you shouldn't roll up any characters on that new account just yet - keep it clean and pristine. And watch this space.

Announcements:

SCAM ALERT: This one is... well, it's from a special and unique snowflake, all right. It claims to be an "exploit" allowing users to get something for nothing.

"Overview:

1) an DAoC account at least 30 days old
2) submission of a 300 word paragraph describing how DaoC fully immersed
him/her into its medieval world"

Then after a lot of silliness, we get to the meat:

Please follow the instructions provided below to activate your 6 months of
subscription:

(insert instructions to provide account names and passwords)

Finally, the Nobel prize winner who dreamed this up explains that Mythic didn't want to use their OWN EMAIL SYSTEM, and farmed the contest out to Yahoo.

If you know anyone who fell for this scam, tell them to contact our billing support with their secret word ASAP and change their password. And tell them not to be embarrassed, people have been taken in by worse.

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Two "Matt Firor, Executive Producer" interviews are floating around the internet if you're a news hound. The first is more of a general industry topic, a transcript from an in person conversation at a trade show: MMORPGdot.com. The second is a little four question FAQ on Catacombs, and MOST fittingly, that exclusive is located at the news and resource site...Catacombs! Man, that amuses me. I don't know why.

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I owe a great big apology to Catriona, the leader of Cannyssagh Saighin of Hibernia, Igraine. She and her people participated in the 1.69 Challenge, and should have been listed among the second place winners. They were not because of a filing error on my part. I salute her, and her guild, and welcome them to the New Frontiers beta.

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What. A. Week. My tell all book is going to have a whole chapter devoted to "Behind the Scenes on Patch Day," let me tell you. Let us all sit back with our slushies, and go kick some enemy realm tail.