Monthly Development Update - May 2016 (Another Year Older)

[Michizure]

Hey everyone! Sorry for how late this update is. This month we’ll be covering what is coming with the Anniversary update, scheduled to arrive on Testlive next week, and Live the week prior to the actual 15th Anniversary, which will be Monday, June 27th.

The Desert Rider & the Nomads
The Tinker, the Desert Rider, and the Desert Nomads will be returning over the next couple of weeks. As in previous years, everyone will be able to help Tinker prepare a trap to lure in the Desert Rider, by collecting and turning in various items obtained from fallen Desert Nomads. Those who contribute significantly in creating the Tinker’s “gift,” as well as those are most crucial in defeating the Desert Rider, are eligible to obtain a full suit of QL 300 Nomad armor. Additionally, whenever the Desert Rider is defeated, it will be possible to collect an extra reward item from the large gift that is left behind.

Elite Desert Nomads have been sighted within the various XBC-Xpm Sites. These champions guard some of the Rider’s most precious wares, but will not be defeated easily.

Membership Offer & Frozen Accounts
For this anniversary, we will be offering a new membership offer. In addition to bonus months of play time, and a number of account rewards, we will be offering a new set of armor: Preview. In addition to the rewards from these offers, months purchased via any of these offers will go towards the Membership Rewards.

From the article:

• Buy three months of Membership and receive one month extra for free, plus one Combat Nano Can which boosts your XP gain by 50% for four hours and the brand new Silencer's Armor Helmet.
• Buy six months of Membership and receive two months extra for free, plus two Combat Nano Cans, the brand new Silencer's Armor Helmet and the Silencer's Tank Armor.
• Buy twelve months of Membership and receive four months extra for free, plus four Combat Nano Cans and the complete Silencer Armor set. This set includes the Helmet, Tank Armor, Body, Legs, two Arms, Feet, Neck and Gloves!

Edit: For the entire duration of the anniversary event, accounts that are frozen, and in good standing, will be allowed to log into the game to celebrate the anniversary event – Hopefully friends new and old will come together to celebrate Anarchy Online’s 15th birth day!

Notum Tower Changes
With this update, all tower sites will have the ability to have a pre-defined time during the day that they will be able to be attacked. The initial implementation will divide up tower plots into 3 categories: 2 based on the most popular times players are active, and 1 to remain with the current system, where the attacking organization can set the timer.

These times are subject to change, as needed. The intention of this change to to assure that a larger group of the game's population will be able to participate in tower wars, without having to live in Hawaii. For those in the Oceania Time Zone, there will still be a crop of towers that can cater to your time zone. In addition to this, more towers will be made available in a wider QL-range within the tower shops, to help with towers changing hands over the coming weeks.

New Research Line
With this update, we will be offering a new personal research line that will be available to all professions. The intention will be offer a new set of levels to obtain for end-game characters, with an additional reward for anyone who is additionally AI-level 30.

Systems Changes
This patch will offer the first larger crop of profession changes since last year’s 18.7 update; while this patch will be far smaller in scope, it will be the first of more regular updates to deal with lingering balance issues.

Veteran Points & Veteran Shop
With this patch, all paid (read as: non-Froob) accounts will be awarded additional Veteran Points! The amount of points handed out is based on how long the account has been a member. Some additional new reward items will be placed within the Veteran Shop to burn those newly acquired points on. Enjoy!

Thank You
This month will be the 15th Anniversary of Anarchy Online. While there is still potentially a couple more surprises in store, I hope everyone will be able to join us for the celebration and enjoy what we have prepared for you. Thank you to everyone who has been a part of this long journey, and to everyone who will continue the adventure with us for another 15 years.

[Alternity]

Input multiplexing?

[Aiken]

Interesting Monthly! Keep up the good work & please take a moment to have a glance at our precious 'crats soon, pretty please

[Oliveerz]

Anyone has the stats for the new armor set? Interesting monthly letter btw, kind of makes me feel the urge to play again.

[Ekarona]

Last!

[Cago30]

"New Research Line" section looks interesting. Wish "we" would consider having more and/or improved micro-transaction options available. As a part-time player I would be real interested in extending my subscriptions as I just cannot invest the time anymore for raiding. There are a lot of gaming companies making a lot of money off of micro-transactions. Thank you for the monthly update.

[Ophiuchus]

Phew, is not horrible news With the delays and Scriv departing FC I was beginning to worry.

Free week for anniversary is good. Pls to be making a big email bomb and spreading the word to MMO news sites.

Timer changes for towers - theoretically a good idea. Let's see what actually happens. I'm reading this after having just got home from an evening out with friends in which an undisclosed volume of alcohol was imbibed so I'm not sure I've grasped the far reaches of what's being suggested here. What will determine which category a particular site is filed under? As in, which of the 2 pre-set + the third free-pick categories will any individual site be placed into?

I'm deeply skeptical of an extra research line if only for the fact that this means more XP grind. Like 200 normal levels, 20 shadowlevels, 30 AI levels and then 70 research levels isn't enough... Is this a full new line - an 8th to make it 80 LE levels? And it is aimed at End Game characters, so there is some kind of level lock on when it can be accessed?

Prof balancing: oh here we go *holds breath*.

Vet points: you say non-froob - does that include SL-only accounts? I ask because in all my years of running an sl-only account, those are normally excluded from all of the paid stuff. Sloob accounts seem to be treated as if they were froob accounts with the SL flag turned on. Also what's happening re: incorrect VPs being allocated to newly rolled characters as of the latest patches (presumably because of the whole veteran account change shennanigans)?

[gresh]

Thank you michi for the ongoing perseverance. An new entire research line is unexpected, wil be interesting to see the rewards it brings. does it need all other reasearch lines to be completed before its available or just 220? what difference will being AI30 make to this line?

gief MP's the notum scurge pet as an extra pet, the defence is now awesome, Rhiwen is now awesome, all we need is the notum scurge instead of the sucky mezz pet and the game is balanced!

[Alternity]

Pretty sure LE80 + AI30 = permanent ai tech 3

[PigBrother]

Very nice news. Very nice ideas (especially the one with "big contribution to tinker gift - chance to get the armor" - way to go !)

I love surprises. I suppose we all do so now I'm even more excited about the celebration !

Don't listen to the haters - they don't know what they are saying...

Ophiuchus is right - spread the word ! Spam the mails of the veterans - do an X-mas in the middle of the summer

Make the first weapon you get in inventory when you are born right-click-able to level up !

Go away from Conan exiles

Make an user for mr. Rui Casais and invite him to read our forum.



.... so much to do - so little time !

[McKnuckleSamwich]

Something, something, multiboxers, won't be able to function in 25% gas?

[Qiquan]

Not a word about mbers, guess with drawing the action into narrow time windows we're supposed to have more real players to fight sadboxes, or more sadboxes to fight sadboxes. Maybe new research has proc that checks if target is MB and automatically sets its health to 1 or 0.

[Literary]

Sounds spiffy!

Could FC kinda sorta maybe FIX the fripping patch server so that it doesn't crap out on patch day?

[Vinkera]

Rebalance, hmm?

I've been twittling my thumbs for about a year now waiting for it :P

[Wakizaka]

Just when I thought I was about to complete the research on my 200s...
Looking forward to perma-AIT3 though.

[Snakebite]

[B][SIZE=4]For a week of the anniversary event, accounts that are frozen, and in good standing, will be allowed to log into the game to celebrate the anniversary event – Hopefully friends new and old will come together to celebrate Anarchy Online’s 15th birth day![\B]

'For a week of the anniversary event...' When will this start, exactly?

[Avari]

Nice work I think. I like regular updates to balance. I've never quite understood the need to make few, big changes instead of small, incremental ones.

Any details on the subscription offers and account rewards?

[Footer]

Some cool changes for sure! Shame to see nothing about MB, but its clear the team have to do more than just work on MB fixes, and this update shows they are doing a good job at that! Working hard guys, keep it up!

Lets just hope the increased hot hours for sites wont encourage even more multibox greifing

[Ophiuchus]

AI 30 (maybe with LE 70/80 or not) giving perma ATE 3 perked would be excellent.

[Dagget]

Nice update overall. Could use a more detailed explanation of the new tower timers, would be nice if Orgs can't easily hide tower vulnerability at low population times.