Chapter 1: Changing times
Unsettling Events
Following the Frahar raid on Pyr and the Dunes of Exile, rumors have been spreading across the surface of the newfound lands. The Kamis are murmuring about conspiracies, the Karavan, mysterious as ever, are showing signs of restlessness and over night the fauna have taken a turn for the worse. It is as if a god had stretched out a hand and meddled with the genetic makeup of the roaming creatures of the world. Some even say that the strange over-sized creatures have metamorphosed and organized themselves to defy hominkind. These are troubling times...
The coming of Terroy OGara
Yet another file of bedraggled Tryker refugees has recently straggled in from the old world. Their leader, Terroy OGara brought knowledge of trading technologies that had long been lost. His clan, having been riders of the baldusa that swim in the lakes of the old world, have joined the guild of Atrium Keepers to apply their riding techniques to mount the common Mektoub. In keeping with the Free Trade Agreement of 2516, Still Wyler, the great Governor of the Trykers, has dispatched envoys to share the new findings with the other homin civilizations.
New merchant trading system
Merchants have developed a new pool system for handling their wares. Stock bought in from the crafters, quarterers and foragers of the world, is added to a common inventory shared across an entire continent. The merchants now tend to offer a selection of items from the common inventory in addition to their usual supply.
A few details:
Merchants only sell items of their own specialty. A light amour merchant will only sell light amour, a range weapon merchant will only sell range weapons and so on.
All merchants have access to their continent's pool. This means that people can sell items of all types to any merchant and have them added to the pool. People can also withdraw all items, that they have sold into the continent's pool, from any merchant, whatever their specialty, on the same continent (on condition that the previously received cash is reimbursed).
The merchants pay a flat rate (known as the 'minimum price') for items as they are placed in the pool and pay out an extra bonus to the seller if the item is sold on to another character within the next 7 days. The seller can choose the retail price at which the item will be sold on. The bonus that they receive if the item is sold on is equivalent to the retail price minus the 'minimum price' previously received.
Merchants will not allow homins to have more than 100 items in the pool at any one time. It is possible to drop items voluntarily from the pool, in which case the seller receives no bonus. It is equally possible to sell items to a merchant that are not to be pooled in which case the seller foregoes any possible bonus.
After 7 days any items still up for sale are automatically dropped by the merchants. The seller will not receive a bonus and will not be able to retrieve the item after this time.
The merchants don't like to propose lists of more than a hundred or so items to browse at a time. This means that it is well worth refining your criteria in order to see items that best match your needs.
With the increase of items on the market, the merchants are no longer interested in worn second hand items. They will only by new, unused materials and gear.
Mounted mektoubs seen on Atys!
There have been sightings of homins mounted on mektoubs! Word has got out that certain elite homins have come upon texts explaining how to tame newfound land mektoubs for riding. However, the mounting technique still remains a closely guarded secret only known to a lucky few. Though some say it is just a question of time before the information gets out and soon every homin throughout the land will have a mektoub mount! This further goes to show homin determination of recovering knowledge lost during the Great Swarming.
A few details:
For the time being only selected members of the guild of Atrium Keepers have access to Mektoub mounts.
Increasing danger from wildlife
Animals are reported as being more aggressive and tougher than before! Officials put it down to an increase in goo concentration in the atmosphere which influences the creatures genetic make-up. Consequently all animals inflict significantly more damage than before. Whats more, deranged giant animals that haunt the darker corners of the world have undergone blood-chilling metamorphoses and appear to be gathering new minions around them. These awesome creatures may have looked pretty wicked before, but now theyd freak the bravest warrior out of his boots!
A few details:
The overall strength of creatures is now indicated by a color and a star level. The color represents the region to which the creature belongs, meaning that creatures from a neighboring region can be identified from their color. The star level represents the type of challenge within the region (from an easy single star to a tough five stars). This strength rating doesn't necessarily convey how large a team is required to tackle the opponent but it gives a good indication of the overall challenge.
The Fighters' taunt powers correspond to given regions. This means that your basic taunt is effective against creatures of the dominant color for your current region but will be less effective against creatures of the next region. The trainers now propose the taunts for neighboring regions at a lower skill level than before in order to enhance the fighters' effectiveness in group situations.
Magic gloves replace baton
With the ever-increasing concern about a possible link between Magic and the Goo, magicians agree to the replacement of the baton for newly developed and more practical magic amplifiers which are less harmful to the environment. These ecological amplifiers take the form of gauntlet gloves for better adhesion and enable the magician to better concentrate magic energy in the palms of the hand without the risk of scorching the skin.
A few details:
With the change in the magic amplifier comes a reduction in the skill point cost of most spells at the trainers. This change gives greater scope for spell specialization and for caster generalization.
It's worth remembering that the skill point costs for new spells available from the trainers depends on the costs of the stanzas in the spell that you don't already know. The costs of stanzas vary from one to another.
The new magic amplifiers require Craft=>Melee=>CloseCombat=>MagicAmplifier crafting skills.
The magic amplifier can be used as a melee weapon inflicting blunt damage on the Fight=>Melee=>CloseCombat=>AdvancedCloseCombat=>HandToHand skill branch.
Sources galore!
There is a great abundance of forage sources springing up around the towns and villages of the newfound lands. The town is all abuzz with the guild of Arium Keepers research into the ways of the land and the forage masters' work to develop new stanzas.
A few details:
The foraging actions for extracting materials now progress in steps of 10 quality levels to fill in the blanks between the previously-existent steps of 50 quality levels. The stanza costs have, of course, all been scaled down accordingly.
New stanzas and actions are now available for detecting sources of a given class only (such as 'basic', 'fine' or 'choice'). The previous set of stanzas that locate sources of lower or similar class to the one given also still exist.
Multi-source prospecting stanzas have been enhanced to locate more sources than before. An action using a '3 source' stanza will usually now locate 3 sources where it previously tended to locate only one or two.
Use of material specialization stanzas in extraction actions now increase the speed at which the quality of the foraged material rises and diminish the risks incurred by the most powerful 'aggressive' extraction speed stanzas. In preservation actions they increase the effectiveness of source preservation actions.
Use of location-type specialization stanzas in extraction actions now diminish the risks incurred by the most powerful 'aggressive' quality and rate stanzas. In preservation actions they increase the effectiveness of source stabilization actions.
Note that the descriptions of the "Prospecting Plan" and "Deposit Tracking" stanzas have been rewritten for clarity and are well worth reading.
A new start
With all of the changes in the world and the developments in the stanza sets a visit to the trainers and townsfolk will be required before stepping back out into the increasingly hostile world.
A few details:
Action & Stanza Reset
Following the large number of improvements made to the action and stanza set, this chapter brings with it a complete action, stanza, power, aura and upgrade reset. This means that characters will find that they only have the set of stanzas and actions that correspond to the options that they selected at character creation. All other stanzas and actions will have vanished. The skill points earned will all be reimbursed allowing everyone to re-think the way best way to specialize their characters. A visit to the trainers to spend the reimbursed spell points will be necessary.
It is important to know that the 'small magic pack' in character creation now contains the 'Acid 1' spell and not the 'Heal 1' spell. Players who had chosen a single magic pack will have the Acid spell and not the Heal spell that they had previously.
It is also important to know that hit point, sap, stamina and focus upgrades are all reset. This means that at the beginning of this chapter all characters will find themselves with 100 Hit Points, 100 Sap, 100 Stamina and 100 Focus.
It is advisable to return to the safety of a town or village and the proximity of a trainer before the reset.
Task Reset
With the modifications to the task set and the replacement of problematic tasks, this chapter brings with it a complete task wipe. All active tasks will be considered to be abandoned.
Patch One Preview
Re: Patch One Preview
FYI - Patch One is expected to go live sometime next week, around Wednesday, November 3rd.