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Some Great Answers.. Instances, Advancement, Mercs etc.
AmazingAvery
Age of Conan AdvocateMember UncommonPosts: 7,188
Athelan answered some recent questions over at tentonhammer: http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/29924
Exilium asks: "Are there alternate routes for advancement to enhance the adventurer, besides the Border Kindom and said raids? If there is nothing of that nature in the current version of the game, are there plans to implement one a year to a year and 6months after launch?"
Athelan: "In general if you use realm points in DAOC, AA in Everquest, Honor in WoW etc they are essentially the same thing as additional levels to the game just in another flavor. We wanted to focus the initial launch on community oriented features and mechanics which we feel are the most important aspect to making "end game" game-play enjoyable. We did have a system for continuing advancement but put it on hold for the time being."
boomshank asks: "How are you going to prevent people underage from subscribing to the game?"
Athelan: "There is no way for us to police people's "true" age as long as they have access to a credit card of someone over the age of 18 and a copy of the game. It's too easy for people to fake who they are or to simply give someone else their account."
wujenfist asks: "My question is when an item has been crafted is there or will there be an opportunity to upgrade an already crated item to either do more dmg or be stronger than its current state?"
Athelan: "Crafted items are customizable via sockets, so you could in theory upgrade the stats of a weapon, but the base weapon will not change."
Zakas asks: "Has Funcom made any improvements to patching processes to minimize server downtimes? Will the servers be all brought down at once: either globally, Internationally by Zone (ie North America, Europe), or will they be upgraded on a smaller scale (server by server?)."
Athelan: "Most extended downtimes are due to hardware or issues with a patch as it is pushed live. As this is unpredictable we can only do our best to pretest content and patching to make sure the live patches go as smooth as possible. I am guessing that servers will be brought down at certain times respective to their time zones to minimize player impact.."
Erinnje asks: "Is the Amazon Curved Bow(from amazon.com) only avaliable to the USA or are there any plans for europe. What Stats/how powerfull can i expect this bow to have/be?"
Athelan: "The bow will be one of the best bows in the game for a part of the game but as you level it will slowly become more normal and eventually be replaced by higher level equipment.
EU Preorder deals are something that we do not have information and partners for that I am aware of."
diavolos asks: "I was wondering in what form the 3-days headstart some shops offer will be. I mean, we will be able to download the game 3 days earlier or the shop will ship the game 3 days earlier?"
Athelan: "You will be able to download and patch prior to the three day headstart then when the headstart goes live your account will be able to login."
Arda asks: "Will there be player made addons, if so what script language will it be in and how much freedom will players have to create their own addons.?"
Athelan: "There is no support for player made addons. Opening up for player addon's opens up the code and game to exploitation and hacking security wise in a very big way. We decided to put all the hooks we could into the interface and allow full re-skinning in XML but no open language for the players to create their own modules.."
Graffix asks: "Will guilds be able to hire themselvs out as mercs with the built in system?"
Athelan: "Mercenary contracts are per individual not per guild. You cannot force your entire guild into a mercenary contract."
waku asks: "Please say that Dark Templars can spellweave. Just respond, "Why yes they can", and I will be very happy?"
Athelan: "No for the same reasons Bear Shamans do not."
Naug asks: "I've heard that when you start a combo you must be standing still for a while. Is this true? If this is the case, this shouldn't be much of a problem in PvE but it would be truly devastating for melee classes in PvP. Is it possible for you to elucidate this matter?"
Athelan: "You can trigger a combo and perform the trigger moves while moving, when the combo itself is being completed you must stop or you will interrupt it."
ILikePonies asks: "Can you confirm I've got the instancing setup for Conan correct (just to be sure we're talking the same language, by instancing I mean merely making a copy of a zone for any reason [for instance I'd call DDO completely instanced, even the city zones], and not just limited to dungeons/raids/etc.)?
Outdoors - not instanced
Cities - not instanced (?)
BKs - not instanced, no player cap (?)
City building interiors - instanced (?)
PvE cities - instanced
Tortage nighttime - instanced
PvP minigames - instanced
Some (all?) dungeons - instanced (some have caps of 100 players)
Anything else I'm missing?"
Athelan: "Your summation is generally accurate. We do not instantiate Outdoor area's etc as much as possible, but we do some quest areas, dungeons, PvP mini game areas, and resource and building playfields (PvE player cities)"
Exilium asks: "Some times its the little things that can get under a players skin. Having to buy water one at a time, not having a repair all button, having to retype a player's name in the mail box for all 20 items you are sending them, and not having an officer chat built into a guild's chat (difference between /gu and /o).
So are the little things like the one's mentioned above, and maybe some that I'm forgetting, already in AoC?"
Athelan: "The little things that bug people vary person to person so pre-planning for the little things is a bit of a waste when you have big things to worry about. This is what the live development of an MMO is there for to react to issues, and continue to evolve the game."
diavolos asks: "No shop (at least that i can buy from) has both mounts in a single copy of the game. My question is, if i will be able to enter a code for rhino and a code for mammoth from separate copies to a single account so i can have both mounts, even by buying two copies of the game?"
Athelan: "Yes you could use both pre-order codes on a single account as far as I am aware of."
Drayen asks: "Will the merc system have any type of compensation for the merc's themselves? ie money or extra experience etc etc."
Athelan: "It is intended to be a monetary contract between the guild hiring the mercenaries and the mercs themselves with a rating system also so you can gain renown for fighting as a merc."
Papagenu asks: "When you make a weapon, will you be able to name it? Like if you made a (going out on a limb here) level 3 bronze sword, would it be called "Level 3 Bronze Sword"? Or could you name it? What about when you gem a weapon?"
Athelan: "Currently you cannot name the items that you craft. This is due to the ability to exploit by naming items after other items, or using other names that might violate terms of service."
Beefheart asks: "I pre-ordered and just want to know if i need to pester gamestop everyday, or just check in with the official AoC website the 17th and put in some kind of code?"
Athelan: "You will receive a key you use to create your account and download the client prior to the 3 day headstart. Then the servers will be turned live for you to login 3 days in advance."
nicholaitabor asks: "Will there be a list available to everybody with mercenaries for hire?"
Athelan: "I think it works the other way. You post a contract then people can apply. Rather than you looking for "looking for job" mercenaries."
Khalathwyr asks: "What is a Hub exactly? Does it include the resource harvesting playfields or is it just the confines of the NPC capital cities?"
Athelan: "Hubs are the three main cities, one in each country."
Comments
No worries, I think gamestop have a system to record your email address and then send out the keys when they have them.
On the flip side I did hear that there will be a direct download including getting bonuses but info on this should be forth coming soon.
Damn!
This game is shaping up to be quite nice! I just hope there is not another delay. To me, I don't want them to release a broken game and I don't mind the fact that they had to delay last year. What I am saying that if you delay a game, you had better make damn sure that the date you set for the future release is going to be more than enough time to finish.
As usual just features, Vanguard did that. What's different is that AoC is using fans to deliver them. Not one Q and A of what most concerns customers.
About the big debate over Open beta.......In America most every product can be returned to the store for your money back but Video games. So yes there should be an open beta or something in place for a return if bad or not satisfied by Funcom. The only exception to this are car manufactures, and by law they have to be repaired under warranty.
I'm not sure how release will go, but I do know Vanguard did everything that Funcom is doing except Funcom is using fans to promote.
good info thank god for being able to move while doing combos (for the most part)
I am little bit concerned about having to stand still while performing a combo in PvP, cause one can just run out of your attack range and waste your combo easily then.
On the other hand I am glad this will be a game without Addons like WoW where you didnt even have to play, you had programs to play it for you and on top of that you paid monthly to have programs play for you. I am really glad that AoC wont be like that.
Sry for WoW flame, I had to.
Thanks Avery, good read. Answered many of my questions, thanks a ton.