AOV News October 2011

[Death]

Greetings AOV,

The last week marks a milestone for AOV as we released the new core to the live server. There are a lot of back end changes and system changes that players may not immediately notice, but will lead to quicker updates in the future such as quests and missing ML content.

We appreciate the player feedback to catch any bugs with the recent patch and are currently working to get them fixed up and to fix up the auto account system for new players.

The new server core is working at a satisfactory level so far. There have been some lag spikes which are due to our host having a few network issues as well as the server doing a lot of processing. We will be looking into the possibility of upgrading to a more powerful server, more details will be available when we plan for the future.

7.0.18.0 (Patch 95) is now required to play on AOV and AOV TC1. We recommend starting a brand new patch and keeping your old client just in case we need to move back to the old system. The enhanced UOSA client is not yet supported in full so we recommend the classic UO client.

With the new changes, here's a few things to expect:

Shard monitoring and bug fixing

We will be concentrating on the shard the next couple of weeks to ensure that it's stable and that we fix the bugs as they are encountered. A lot has been changed recently so there's potential for problems.

Let us first say that shard reverts are a possibility on the live server. We have moved over to a completely new saving structure so problems may be found and need to be fixed so be prepared for such possibilities. We will be keeping players informed and will try to make the transition as smooth as possible.

Shard Revamping and Updates

It looks as though we have torn down the barrier that has been keeping us from doing regular shard updates. That being said, as we monitor the shard over the next few weeks, if everything is looking solid, we will move on to other things with the shard.

Shard Revamp

The shard revamp is now considered an ongoing process. When we first started the revamp, we did not realize how large a task the revamp would prove to be. We have grown a lot wiser on how to properly revamp and will be doing things differently from now on.

In the future, we will be revamping the following systems (In no particular order):

- Other artifacts and item that were not addressed (Recipe types, stealables and Demitel artifacts)
- Custom monsters such as phantom asps, poison ivy, etc.
- Custom pets such as ancient wyrms, coeurls, etc
- Custom items such as land mines, water gems and coal ore
- Custom hues/colors as well as creating a naming index to globally identify hues/colors in the game.

Player feedback during the previous artifact revisions were greatly appreciated. In the future, when we begin revamping another area, we will be using a similar method.

The next revamping is not expected for some time as there are other more important areas to concentrate on.

Because the revamp is an ongoing system, there are other areas which will need revisions but are very complex and involved such as:

- Skill revamps such as bard skills, ninjitsu, spellweaving
- Crafting and Recipes
- Loot and Instanced Corpses

We have already started gathering information on what we need to make these revisions happen but these systems will take a long time to do so they will be planned at a later date and time, most likely start or mid 2012.

Updates

Now that the new core is on the shard, we can start to do more updates. Provided the new core holds up and works as intended, updates will be more frequent. Updates can include anything from new content to bug fixes.

The next shard publish is estimated to be on Monday, October 10, 2011. This will be just in time for Canadian Thanksgiving so there may be more turkeys lurking around in Sosaria.

Additional UOML content and fixes

We are now working to complete the remainder of UOML content. We've had most of it before but the stuff that's missing will be gradually worked in, most likely something new added in each publish.

Dungeons

UOML dungeons will be gradually revised for missing content and changes to accuracy:

- Monster abilities
- Spawn points and respawn times
- Trigger spawners such as Flurry and Mistral in the labyrinth
- Environmental effects such as the sand maze in the Twisted Weald and toxic crypt in Bedlam
- UOML champion spawns and loot (Ilhenir, Twaulo and Meraktus)
- Peerless boss abilities and loot

UOML Quests

UOML quests will be gradually added to the game once they are properly coded and tested out. Players will be informed once they are available.

Community Collections

The community collections are currently being reviewed and are working perfectly to tailor to OSI items as well as custom additions. They are being finalized at the moment with the Vesper Museum planned as early as the next patch.

The Moonglow zoo and Britain library will follow after. The Britain library has a quest chain to design and test and the Moonglow zoo has some transferring checks to do to ensure a smooth donation through pets. Custom pets must also be added to the list of turn ins.

Thanksgiving and Halloween Event

We will be celebrating Canadian Thanksgiving this year with a smaller event. This event will also be available for Thanksgiving in November.

A large, custom Halloween Event will be made this year for players to enjoy. This event will be a lot more thorough than any other event AOV has had to date. There will be a bit of everything for this event. Details will be available in October.

Stay tuned on the forums and in game for more details

Archived topic from AOV, old topic ID:6043, old post ID:36437

[Red Squirrel]

We are now a bit over a week into the new major patch I'm quite pleased to say that things are going smooth. The backups have been implimented and are working flawlessly, and I've also implimented the proceedure to sync the data to TC1. Overall the engine is solid and there are zero chances of reverting at this point.

The only thing you may have noticed is there is a lot of lag, which may be partially due to the host as well, but the server does seem a bit more taxed. I do not have the money yet, but a new server is being considered in the future to aliviate this issue.

Archived topic from AOV, old topic ID:6043, old post ID:36504