Awww

August 17th, 2009
Stats, PvP, New Classes and Level Cap Raises...
So What's The Hold Up?
Hi Guys,
I just wanted to let you know what is going on and why we haven't told you about all the progress that we've been making toward our goals.

It's because there hasn't been any.

That's not actually true but the truth is less fun to say.

It all comes down to Stats. Needless to say giving your character stat points that effect your HP, Mana, Damage, Crit, Hit, Miss and other attributes will change the game in very dramatic way. Your build will become a very large part of who you are and how you play your classes.

It will also create a lot of problems. How do we gap the level differences when your friend makes a new character and wants to play with your uber, maxed-out, top-shelf, godlike character? How can you stick with one build when you can change classes at the drop of a hat? Do we let you rebuild your character every time you change clothes? These are only a few of the several very large roadblocks that have stopped up from beginning member-only testing of Stats.

Which stops us from doing everything else.

Stats will have a HUGE effect on Player Versus Player (PvP) combat... how long you survive in a fight with another player, how much you can heal yourself, maybe your attack speed, maybe how often you crit on another player, maybe how often you resist crits. Until stats are finished and released we can't move forward on PvP.

How about some new classes, then? *sigh* Those depends on stats too. Every new skill has to be balanced so that no new class is redonkulously overpowered compared to the others. Creating a new class takes some serious effort and thought as well as testing and If we made a new one now, we'd spend a week or more balancing it out only to have to REbalance it when stats are released, along with all the existing classes, which would mean it would take longer to get to YOU. Until stats are released we're stuck there too.

Ok then, Can you just raise the level cap by 10 or even 5? *cries* We can't. Aside from keeping the power levels reasonable so that any player can play new content without finding it too terribly easy or impossible, we still have the New Player Teams With Maxed Player thing to deal with. When we add stats that will make that gap even wider, and break everything. Until we know how stats are going to effect leveling up, then we can't raise the cap.

So we're kinda stuck. No luck. Sitting ducks. Which... stinks.

That's not to say that we haven't made HUGE strides in base functionality. I mean, PvP works... and it's AWESOME. Beleen, Ai No Miko, Llussion and I spent a good hour or two on the mod server whacking each other and knocking each other out. It was Girls versus Boys. We won. But don't tell them that. It was a LOT of fun but also VERY broken.

You guys will get to see, when we get the member only testing servers up and you faithful AQW members can help us iron out some of the bugs, but we MUST get stats out before that can happen.

Believe me, we are racking our brains trying to solve all the game breaking issues having to do with stats... sometimes we are even racking each others brains, whatever that means. We are getting closer and closer to a working solution every day and soon.... very soon, we'll have one.

After that, you'd better be ready for the awesome-sauce that follows... or else you'll drown in that sauce. Not a pretty picture.

Back to work... This week Vath tries to awaken the next Chaos Beast. If you're going to stop him you're going to need a little more firepower than what the dwarves can offer. If only you could gets your hands on a big, purple dragon somehow....

Heh.

Ai No Miko: P.S. They did NOT win