Archive for the ‘General News’

UO General Announcements & Official News

Stratics Launches QA5 Series

November 04, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Stratics Launches QA5 Series

Kai Schober

4 Nov 2011 17:51:07 EST

Stratics has just announced the start of QA5 – a series of short interviews with various members of the teams around Ultima Online. These five questions will give you an introduction to the producers, developers, event moderators and all the others contributing to your UO experience.

The series starts with 5 questions for Bonnie “Mesanna”, Associate Producer for Ultima Online.

What project that you were involved in are you the proudest of?

I actually have two projects, the success of the first External Testing Team and the current Event Moderator Program. We have a great creative team that works really hard to come up with ideas that are played out in a unique style to each EM.

Follow the link to Mesanna’s QA5.

Have a nice weekend and see you in-game!

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Incorrect Account Age

November 03, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Incorrect Account Age

Rowland Cox

3 Nov 2011 16:10:02 EST

Greetings

With the new Veteran Rewards being released some of you have noticed your account ages are not showing correctly. We are aware of this and working to correct this issue. As soon as we have it worked out we will post again to keep players informed.

Thank you for your patience.

 

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Critical Fix To Origin

November 03, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Critical Fix To Origin

Rowland Cox

3 Nov 2011 17:31:18 EST

Greetings,

Due to the critical issue found on Origin we are going to revert it to the last publish date which was 11/1. We are sorry for the time lost, but do not want you to lose any more items because of this issue. As you know Origin is a test server, and from time to time we have to fix things here by reverting. We appreciate your understanding and willingness to take this all in stride.

  • Loot fix in Shame that was causing player items to be reformatted.
  • You can now drag and drop items into the SOT Book and Seed boxes
  • Corrected an issue with obtaining the Seed box in the Veteran Reward System
  • Summoned pets will no longer attack each other
  • Fixed an issue with the respawn timer on the Cave Troll in Shame

Our apologies again to the Origin players,

The UO Team

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Producer’s Letter – 11/02

November 02, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Producer’s Letter – 11/02

Jeff Skalski

2 Nov 2011 18:22:39 EST

Hello UO Fans,

I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself properly. My name is Jeff Skalski and I’m the Ultima Franchise Producer here at BioWare. As many of you know Calvin left us two months ago to move onto his next adventure in life. I’ve stepped in to help Mesanna and the team to stay on course. It’s been a wild and challenging ride since I joined the team and I still have plenty to catch up on in terms of the latest UO content. In fact, I have exactly 12 years to catch up on which is a lot in the MMO space. Before I go any farther let’s get some of the big questions I’m sure on your minds out of the way…

1) Franchise Producer for Ultima? What does that mean?

It means I have the best job in the world. Never in my wildest dreams did I think this was ever going to happen. Who would have thought some UO RP’ing high school kid from the 90’s who got into the beta would get this opportunity 15 years later. I’ve been a huge fan of this franchise for quite some time. It started the day I first played Ultima 1 on my friends Macintosh and continued with each new adventure into Britannia. We love Ultima here at BioWare and have a huge respect for what it has accomplished. Ultima made a huge impression on so many of us who work on RPG’s and MMO’s.

We have lots of exciting things to share, however that day is not today. I will say we are just getting started. The rereleases of the classics on GOG.com were just the beginning. Launching UltimaForever.com and giving players an official place to download for free one of my favorite games in the series, Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar is just a baby step to where we are going. Expect to see more content celebrating all things Ultima on that site over the coming months. Meanwhile, UO will continue to move forward with your help. The team and I really want to hear what you want to see next, so please let us know. I can’t promise everything, but I can promise we’ll consider everyone’s feedback as we layout the plan for the next 14 years. 😉

2) What are your plans for Ultima Online?

Well, being that I’m a retired UO player who’s in the transition of becoming active again, there are 3 areas of focus I plan to put a lot of my time and energy towards.

  • Communication with the people of Britannia who matter most… you the players.
    • I’ve been doing a lot of reading and listening lately. It’s obvious to me that you demand to hear more from us, so I plan to improve that. Starting with this 8 week late Producer letter. (Hey at least I admitted it.) Joking aside, I had a lot of Ultima Online to catch up on before I felt I could type this up.
    • Second, for those UOForums and Stratics users you’ll see me and the team online more. We’re going to be kicking off weekly Q&A sessions with members of the team. Expect to hear from Mesanna soon.
  • Breathing life back into areas that have long been forgotten.
    • Ultima Online is huge. It’s crazy to even begin try to explain the scale of the game to a new player. As the game has grown over the last decade some areas have begun to get lost in the shadow of new content and features. I really want to see new life brought back to these areas and keep you guys and girls on your toes. You’ll see a little of that each publish. Just like the upcoming Shame dungeon revamp in pub 73.
  • Last, but definitely not least, kill bugs.
    • We have too many bugs sitting in our queue and I want to take an aggressive approach to fixing them. We won’t be able to knock them all out at once, but we can start taking out chunks of them each publish. We read the bugs lists on the forums and I’m planning to reach out to the community on which ones we should attack first.

Before signing off on this letter I just want to say it’s refreshing to come back to UO and still see so many passionate fans from all corners of the globe dedicated to this world of Sosaria. 2012 will no doubt be an exciting year for us all as we build up to the 15th year anniversary.

Cheers everyone and see you online,

Jeff Skalski
Ultima Franchise Producer
Tweet me anytime at @jeff_skalski

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Publish 73 Comes to Origin

November 01, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Publish 73 Comes to Origin

Kai Schober

1 Nov 2011 15:56:05 EST

Greetings,

We’ll push Publish 73.0 to Origin today, Tuesday 1st at 5:00 pm EDT.

Please check the previously posted Publish 73 Notes and Additions. Here are are the additional changes:

Publish 73.0.0


 

Christmas Gifts

  • Customizable Welcome Mats (2 styles)
  • Vocal Santa Statue
  • Customizable House type signs
  • Scroll of Transcendence Book

Veteran Reward Items

This year for the 14th year we have added the following in celebration:

  • Group Bracelet of Binding – This item allows you to bind with 10 people at once. Handy for those times when part of your group is lost or has issues with running into trees and being left behind.
  • Seed Box – This box will identify all seeds put into the box, it will hold and organize up to 500 seeds.
  • Shard Shields – We have added this as the 14th year vet reward. These are new art that represents a specific shard. The shield will give you a character transfer token once a month to the shard it represents. The token is account bound, so they can not be traded or sold. If you have a shield in your house and the house decays the shield will disappear.
  • Sheep Statue – This statue is a resource giver, it will give you 10 pieces of a random hide or wool. This caps at 100 resources so make sure you collect your items.

Britianna Clean up change

  • Added 4 new pigments – Polished Bronze, Glossy Blue, Black and Green and Deep Violet – 5 charges @ 250,000 points. We will be changing this out each month so stock up while you can.

 

Shame Loot Changes

Durabilities are now different for Brittle and Cannot Be Repaired:

  • If an item is Brittle and does not have Cannot Be Repaired, its durability is 35.
  • If an item has Cannot Be Repaired and does not have Brittle, its durability is 150.
  • If an item has Cannot Be Repaired and also has Brittle, its durability is 75.
  • Self-Repair and Durability Increase cannot appear on any item with Brittle or Cannot Be Repaired.

It is now possible for the following item properties to spawn:

  • Faster Casting (Jewelry, Weapons, Shields)
  • Battle Lust (Melee Weapons)
  • Slayers (Weapons)
  • Balanced (Bows)
  • Mage Armor (Non-Medable Armor)
  • Spell Channeling (Weapons, Shields)
  • Night Sight (Jewelry)
  • Reactive Paralyze (Two-Handed Melee, Bows, and Shields)
  • Use Best Weapon Skill (Melee Weapons)
  • Gargoyle Earrings will now drop

 

Classic Client 7.0.19


 

  • Trial accounts can only join the Help Channel

Enhanced Client 4.0.19


 

  • Trial accounts can only join the Help Channel

UO General Announcements & Official News

Additional Content of Publish 73 on Test Center

October 28, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Additional Content of Publish 73 on Test Center

Kai Schober

28 Oct 2011 16:31:50 EST

Here are the promised additions to the Publish Notes of version 73.0:

Clean up Britiannia

  • Added 4 new pigments  – Polished Bronze, Glossy Blue, Black and Green and Deep Violet – 1 charge 250,000 points.  We will be changing this out each month so stock up while you can

Arena’s

Arenas Go Live

The arenas located throughout the lands will go live with this publish. The arenas are located in the Lost Lands (both facets), Haven, and Ocllo. The following additions and changes have been made after the public testing done on the arenas test shard:

  • Match hosts may now choose to allow or disallow Field Spells
  • Match hosts now choose to allow or disallow potions, or to allow only non-healing potions
  • A bug that caused some summoned creatures to attack their owner in an arena match has been fixed

Moving forward, we will continue to accept feedback and use it to  make further improvements to the arenas. In an future publish, look for the addition of a wagering system.

New High Resolution Terrian Art

As I am sure most of you have noticed the difference in the terrain in the Enhanced Client.  Just letting everyone know this is just the first of many more to come.  Next publish we will be updating the Wall tile art, I think everyone will really appreciate the new look.  Below are a few pictures of what is coming:

 

 

We are looking foward to getting your feedback! 

Your UO Team

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Shard of the Dead: Dungeon Deathmatch Edition

October 28, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Shard of the Dead: Dungeon Deathmatch Edition

Kai Schober

28 Oct 2011 15:21:34 EST

We are proud to announce our annual Shard of the Dead. This year, we’ve started with a clean slate to bring you an all new toe-to-toe slugfest. We’ve swept the elementals out of Dungeon Shame and replaced them with some gruesome and hellish beasts along with some exciting loot. Here’s how it works:

You may create a character on the Shard of the Dead, or copy a character from your regular shard. No matter which option you choose, you will arrive without any items, money, or pets on a platform where you must choose to join a team. Enter either the Order Gate or the Chaos Gate, and you will be transported to a safe haven for your team. Here, you must obtain some gear and supplies, in order to prepare to enter the Infernal Battlegrounds.

Lucky for you, the dungeon floors are literally strewn with powerful magic items. All you have to do is survive long enough to grab some and put them on. You may sell items you don’t want to get precious gold to buy basic supplies. Picking up new skills is incredibly fast. There are items that grant stat boosts as well.

Once you accumulate enough to fight the monsters in the dungeon, you will find they drop still more powerful loot, along with gold and items that allow you to summon strong pets.

Be careful, though! All your equipment is cursed. If you die, you must start naked again in your team’s base.

If you can gather a group of friends, have a go at the Disciple of Lucifer. He’s extremely tough, but his loot is very worthwhile. One of his treasures is a deed to bless a single item, making it just a little bit easier to start over.

Every few minutes, a gate in each team’s base will open, taking all who dare to go to the Infernal Battlegrounds. Here, Order and Chaos engage in a struggle to capture each others’ bases, and to hunt down and slay The Butcher. Fighting in these battles offers opportunities for still greater rewards, including the Supreem Headless Bomb and the Flask of Invulnerability, along with your pick of the cursed items picked from the corpses of your slain enemies.

Scoreboards in each team’s base show battle records, and players’ mouseover tooltips show their PvP stats.

So come on down to Shard of the Dead and join us in the slaughterfest!

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Treasure Hunt – A New Challenger Has Risen!

October 28, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Treasure Hunt – A New Challenger Has Risen!

Kai Schober

28 Oct 2011 11:45:48 EST

Having defeated Sonoma in the last Cross Shard Treasure Hunting Challenge, the Blue Beetles of Catskills knew they would have to defend their title soon enough. What wasn’t known was just who they would be defending it against. We now have an answer as the shard of Napa Valley has delivered the following challenge to Catskills:

The ages pass and a new power rises from the Myst of the Mountains deep in the Napa Valley! A new voice cries out to be recognized and make their stand! We are Napa Valley and we throw down the gauntlet in a test of wits and stamina of the Cross Shard Treasure Hunt Challenge against Catskills. The Treasure Hunters of Napa Valley boldly stand to take possession of the trophy and bring it Home where it belongs!

In accordance with the rules of competition, the Champions respond:

Challengers of Napa Valley,

    Bold words to suggest our trophy belongs with you! Perhaps the Myst of the Mountains has clouded your vision, or the wine of your vineyards impaired your minds; For if you saw clearly the monumental task that lay before you, you would not speak in such confidence! The Blue Beetles will bewilder you with their speed, bedevil you with their skill, and beguile you with their good looks.

    Make no mistake – our bravado is well earned. We respect your desire to Challenge, however. Therefor in keeping with the rules of the competition, we accept – and look forward to proving once again that the true “home” for the title is with Catskills.

–    Shard Catskills

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
DATE: Tuesday, November 8th, 2011
TIME: 6:30pm Pacific, 9:30pm Eastern
PLACE: The Chessboard in Nujel’m, Test Center

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Publish 73 Comes to Test Center

October 27, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Publish 73 Comes to Test Center

Kai Schober

27 Oct 2011 12:10:46 EST

Greetings,

Publish 73 comes to Test Center this afternoon, along with the Enhance Client Patch 4.0.19 and the Classic Client Patch 7.0.19.

Here are the notes for your reading pleasure, thanks!

Publish 73.0


Shame Upgrade

Dungeon Shame has been revised. The monsters have been revised to be a little bit more challenging and scaled in difficulty for new-to-veteran players. The shame loot system has been revised so you should notice less items with throw-away intensity values on properties, and an overall improvement in the loot generated.

First and second levels will provide a good training ground for journeyman to adept skill levels while level 3 should provide a little more of a challenge. On the first 3 levels there will be a renowned monster that can be spawned at a key point in the dungeon by summoning from an altar to give you a taste of the monster difficulty at the next level.

All the monsters within the dungeon have a chance to drop dungeon crystals which can be used to spawn the renowned of each level. In certain areas there will also be a chance when killing creatures for a renowned version of those creatures to be spawned. Similar to a paragon but not as  friendly.

Level 5: The monsters on level 5 are a bit heavier and harder hitting than the other levels.

Overview of Shame’s purpose

  • All new MOBs to thrill and kill!
  • Each level more devestating than the last!
  • MOB corpses possibly contain Shame Dungeon Crystals
  • Shame Dungeon Crystals may be consumed to increase player’s Shame Dungeon Points… or used for whatever.
  • Shame Dungeon Points spent on altars in the first three levels of Shame.
  • These altars spawn new, tenacious Elite MOBs.
  • Collect all three, if you dare!
  • Cave Troll Wall Guardians
  • You’ve got to pay the Troll Toll if you want to get in the bowels of Shame.
  • The price… death.
  • Can you clear Shame in just an apron? Few have tried, none have succeeded.

Bard Mastery Adjustments

PvM Damage is now a chance to interrupt based on damage amount
Upkeep Cost Reduced for all abilities.
Mana Cost reduced from 1 for every 2 targets to 1 for every 5 targets
Base Upkeep Cost Reduced by 1
INSPIRE 4
INVIGORATE 5
PRESERVANCE 5
RESILIENCE 4
TRIBULATION 10
DESPAIR 12
Inspire:
Bonus Damage Modifier: 1 – 15%  To ALL Damage
Resilience:
Regeneration Increased from  1- 11 to  1-22
Preservance:
Damage Reduction/Defense Chance  Bonus Increased from 1-22 to 1-30
Despair:
Damage Type now selectable through context menu on spellbook.
Spellbooks without the context menu can be fixed by casting the despair spell once

Alchemy/Enhancement Potions

  • Alchemy will now provide a similar functionality to enhance potions as magic resist does to base resistances.
  • Combined Enhanced Potions Effect will remain as  Alchemy / 3.3 + Enhace Potions = (30 + 75)
  • Minimum Enhance potions effect = Alchemy / 2.0   ( 0-50%)

EC Terrain Texture Updates

Some terrain types in the EC client have been updated for scaling and to improve overall detail.

Shame Itemization Upgrade

Coupled with the revamp of Dungeon Shame, Publish 73 introduces a new random magic item generation system. This new system will only create items for monster kills in Shame, and for the lost-and-found items for the Honesty virtue. Loot drops elsewhere in the game world are unaffected, though the plan will be to eventually convert loot drops throughout Sosaria to use this new system.

The new loot generator creates an exciting array of new possibilities:

  • Some magic item properties will now appear on types of items they have not been seen on before.
  • Many magic items will have negative properties, such as Cursed, Cannot be Repaired, Brittle, and Unlucky. These items will receive more power than standard items to compensate for their disadvantages.
  • Some items will be generated with item properties designed to fit a theme and work together. These items will be named.
  • Luck will play a significant role in loot generation with this system.

Here are the details:

  • Any item generated by this new system will have a line near the bottom of its tooltip:
    • Minor Magic Item
    • Lesser Magic Item
    • Greater Magic Item
    • Major Magic Item
    • Lesser Artifact (this is approximately equivalent to an item Imbued to the max)
    • Greater Artifact
    • Major Artifact
    • Legendary Artifact
  • The strength of an item generated depends partially on the strength and toughness of the creature killed.
  • There is a very small chance that a loot drop will be a very powerful item.
    • This can happen with weak creatures, but is extremely rare
    • This is more likely to happen with stronger creatures
    • Luck significantly increases the chance of this happening
  • Item Strength has these effects on loot generation:
    • Weak named items will tend to have fewer than 5 properties, leaving open slots for Imbuing
    • Weak random items will generally have 5 item properties at low values
    • Stronger items will tend to have 5 item properties
    • Extremely powerful items will sometimes have more than 5 item properties
    • Weak items tend to not be named, and to have random item properties
    • Stronger items have a better chance of being generated as Named Items
    • Weaker items have smaller chances of being generated with Disadvantages
    • Stronger items have a much greater chance of being generated with Disadvantages
  • Many item properties generated by this system have more coarse granularity of values:
    • For example, Luck only appears in increments of 10
    • For example, Skill bonuses only appear in increments of 5
  • Disadvantages:
    • These appear on items randomly.
    • More powerful items tend to receive more disadvantages
    • Each disadvantage grants the item significantly more power
    • The disadvantages are:
      • Unlucky
        • Item shows “Luck -100” in tooltip
        • Item cannot have Luck and Unlucky at the same time
        • Provides a small boost to overall item power
      • Brittle
        • Item is 25 durability.  Cannot use Powder of Fortification
        • Item cannot have Brittle and Durability at the same time
        • Provides a moderate boost to item power
      • Cannot Be Repaired
        • Item cannot be repaired by any means. Cannot use PoF
        • Provides a high boost to item power
      • Cursed
        • Item cannot be insured or blessed
        • Provides an extreme boost to item power
    • Items that are free of disadvantages can be generated
      • Powerful items are very rarely “clean”
      • Weaker items are frequently “clean”
    • Luck has no influence on the frequency of item Disadvantage generation
  • Item Generation
    • Creatures are assigned a difficulty rating
    • When the creature is killed, its Difficulty Rating and the killers’ Luck factor into loot generation
      • More difficult creatures generate more items
      • Each item receives a Base Item Property Budget
      • Each item receive s a Bonus Item Property Budget
      • The Bonus property budget may be added multiple times
      • The higher the killer’s Luck, the higher the chance of multiple Bonus Budget
    • After the item budget is determined:
      • The higher the Budget, the more Disadvantage Rolls are made for the item
      • Each Disadvantage Roll has a chance of adding a new Disadvantage
      • Each Disadvantage adds a fixed bonus to the item’s Budget
    • Once the final Budget is known:
      • The higher the Budget, the greater the chance of generating Named Items
      • The higher the Budget, the more Item Properties will be added
    • Finally, the Budget is spent to add Item Properties to the item
  • Named Items
    • There are 12 “packages” of Item Properties.
    • Each Package contains a group of properties fitting a purpose or a theme
    • Each package is associated with a Name Prefix
    • Each package is associated with a Name Suffix
    • Items can be generated as:
      • Unnamed (random properties)
      • Prefix Only (some properties from one package, some random)
      • Suffix Only (some properties from one package, some random)
      • Prefix and Suffix (some properties from one package, some from a different package)

The Name Prefixes and Suffixes

Prefix: Mighty                  Suffix: of Vitality                     Theme: Strength and Hit Point-related
Prefix: Mystic                  Suffix: of Sorcery                    Theme: Intelligence and mana-related
Prefix: Animaged             Suffix: of Haste                       Theme: Dex, Stamina, and Speed
Prefix: Arcane                 Suffix: of Wizardry                  Theme: Spell casting modifiers
Prefix: Exquisite              Suffix: of Quality                     Theme: Item Quality / Durability
Prefix: Vampiric              Suffix: of the Vampire            Theme: Leeches and Drains
Prefix: Invigorating         Suffix: of Restoration             Theme: Regeneration (incl. damage eaters)
Prefix: Fortified               Suffix: of Defense                   Theme: Damage avoidance
Prefix: Auspicious           Suffix: of Fortune                    Theme: Luck
Prefix: Charmed              Suffix: of Alchemy                  Theme: Enhance Potions (incl. Balanced)
Prefix: Vicious                 Suffix: of Slaughter                 Theme: Dealing Damage (incl. Slayers)
Prefix: Towering             Suffix: of Aegis                       Theme: Mitigating damage taken (incl. resists)

Example Items

The Ring is free of disadvantages. The Bracelet is Cursed, which boosts its Item Property strength up to “Greater Magic Item”.

Bug Fixes

  • Then a pitcher is filled from a barrel it will no longer have 5 counts of water it will now have 40.
  • Fixed the issue with TC1 not linking to Ter Mur when wiped
  • Bird and Bovine slayers should now be factored in imbuing and insurance
  • You can no longer dye toggled quest items
  • Thunderstorm  spell should now show the correct effect
  • Bladeweave will no longer function on non bleedable creatures
  • Removed Double strike from the list of bladeweave attack options
  • Added extra weight to liquor barrels which contains liquor.
  • Even if players are on 2 or more NPE skill gain quests and complete one of them, the buff icon no longer disappear.
  • Hired NPCs no longer vanish randomly.
  • Fix a bug that players couldn’t re-fill a pot of eggnog.

Legacy client  7.0.19


  • Cliloc Changes
  • Players have the ability to ignore other players in Global Chat, this ignore affects Global chat only.

Enhanced Client  4.0.19


  • Cliloc Changes
  • Players have the ability to ignore other players in Global Chat, this ignore affects Global chat only.

 

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UO General Announcements & Official News

Email About Automatic Renewal Issues

October 21, 2011 By: Watchertoo Category: General News

Email About Automatic Renewal Issues

Kai Schober

21 Oct 2011 11:00:03 EST

Greetings,

Last week a change in the EA account center accidently de-activated the automatic subscription renewal for several UO accounts. Yesterday we e-mailed all effected persons and have re-activate the automatic renewal for those accounts.

If you have encountered related issues with your account, please check your inbox.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

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