2011

A Bit of a Rant Concerning GU61 #EQ2

Like every gamer out there, every so often something really makes me frustrated, and what else is this blog for besides sharing my thoughts or at least getting them off of my chest. I apologize that this post won’t be my usual glorious ‘rah rah’ cheerleader version of whatever game I’m playing – but yesterday game update 61 went live and EQ2 and personally speaking it was by far the WORST update in EQ2 history, baring GU13 which was actually quite needed once the anger died down. That’s right, I said it.

To start things off the update was so bad that they have decided to re-unattune all gear (including banked gear this round) and pop off adornments (only on worn gear) and re-set aa specs once more (this time properly) today. That means the hours I spent fixing up my characters yesterday were for naught. In preparation at least I did manage to strip my main characters so that their adornments won’t pop off this time, causing me to search my bags in wonder exclaiming “where the heck did this one go!”

Those were not even some of the main issues. The itemization revamp that went live could have used a few more weeks (or months) of testing. To begin with, all Sentinel’s Fate gear is now better then DoV gear in terms of ‘extra’ stats. Players promptly ran off to one group Toxxulia because her gear was better then what they were wearing. That junky trash loot from Library (specifically a helm that constantly dropped from the first named) has better critical mitigation and ‘blue stats’ then my Ry’Gorr DoV gear. Trakanon loot was changed to legendary. The fabled charm from SF collections, legendary (from fabled), enervated and heritage quests were not revamped yet although they are probably actually used and worn as gear more then anything else that was revamped.

That’s not to say all was doom and gloom. The new crafted items added are quite nice, the new house ranking system works gloriously.

The new dungeons have already had their gear nerfed, and after I watched the discoveries going on last night it was no wonder. I have no idea what the general idea was during the creation of those items but they were better then x4 gear that people had been sporting. It’s gear I would expect to see during the next expansion, and not during the remainder of DoV.

There were other issues, too. Some leather crafted pants had a chain graphic and were worn on the hands. Roundshields (whether intentional or not) are no longer allowed by scouts, but are priest only which means the nice shield I had saved up for my ranger now sports wis and a +dps buff that she can no longer use. Forums were filled with bug reports and issues and I can’t help but feel sorry that this update ever went live. It required a LOT more testing.

Time to get back to my regular cheery posts. In the mean time, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself.

 

RIFT 1.4.1 – Half-Birthday Event! – 25/8/11 #RiftGame

HAPPY HALF-BIRTHDAY, RIFT!
* Join us in celebrating 6 months of the Ascended in Telara! Everyone is welcome – bring your friends, bring your family, RIFT is open to all with a special trial for non-subscribers!
* SUBSCRIBER BONUSES: The following bonuses are in effect: Bonus XP, Favor, Prestige, Guild Experience, Marks of Ascension, Plaques of Achievement, and Planarite!
* Check out Meridian and Sanctum where rumors of delicious cake abound.
* All subscribers receive additional presents at the close of the event!
* See the website linked above for more specifics on the Half-Birthday Celebration.

GENERAL
* The crafted chest piece, Hauberk of the Keeper, now includes way more tank stats. Finally.
* Luminescent Conch Shell effect now persists through death.
* Water Saga: Meetings of Interest: Quest markers now appear properly for the Defiant version of this quest.
* Scarwood Reach: The Bloodsilk Broodmother ambush in Infested Range now has a cooldown between ambushes.
* Fixed a bug causing some item set bonuses to behave in certain circumstances as if more than one item in the set was equipped.
* Planar Essences purchased from vendors can no longer be Runebroken or Salvaged, in line with the general case of vendor purchased items not being able to be broken down.
* LFG Group leaders using raid frames can no longer move players outside of Group 1.
* Quickening Brews now work on their correct cooldown groups. Quickening Brews now have a duration of 5 seconds.
* Fixed an issue where going linkdead would cause players to have a PvP Invulnerability buff when reconnecting.
* Having recently transferred your character between shards will no longer lock out that character from being copied to the PTS.

SOULS
* Corrected the values on the Rasmolov’s Synergy Crystals for Riftblade and Paragon that were providing more damage enhancement than was intended.
* Closing Rifts should no longer de-stealth Rogue participants.

REAVER
* Fixed a bug causing Incite to trigger Subdue.

RIFTBLADE
* Elemental Touch: Fixed a recently introduced bug that caused this ability to be enhanced by other abilities that should not have been increasing its damage.

WARLORD
* Rallying Command: Fixed this being allowed to chain its effect in some circumstances. Characters with the post-Rallying-Command debuff will be blocked from receiving Rallying Command again until the debuff wears off.

HAMMERKNELL
* Slightly reduced the hit points of NPCs in upper Hammerknell.
* Players not on the ramparts when Inwar Darktide’s encounter begins will be teleported to the encounter.
* Murdantix: Toned down the frequency of Demonic Tar.
* Rune King Molinar:
– Increased casting time of Prince Dollin’s Consuming Essence.
– Reduced hit points of Rune King Molinar, Prince Dollin, and Incorporeal Revenant.
– Reduced the damage dealt by Forgotten Steward’s Honor’s Sting.
– Prince Dollin’s Cursed Flames now hits a smaller area.
* Estrode: Fixed an issue where Estrode would not use several abilities while under the effects of Scatter the Shadows.
* Inquisitor Garau: Glacial Shield no longer has a casting time.
* Inquisitor Garau: Arcane Porters are now immune to stun effects.
* Grugonim: Grugonim will no longer reset in the middle of a channeled ability if his target moves too far away.

RIVER OF SOULS
* Reduced the amount of general population pulls in the zone.
* Reduced hit points slightly on general population NPCs.
* Herald Gaurath minions: Voidbound Rage is now purgeable.
* Herald Gaurath minions: Reduced the damage of Impending Doom.

IRON TOMB
* Expert: Bonelord Fetlorn: Will now cast Bone Theft more than once per fight, as he should!

PVP
* Favor, Notoriety, and quest credit for PvP Rifts are only granted to players who are still in the PvP Rift’s zone at the time it is closed.
* The number of Charhounds required for Stillmoor PvP dailies has been reduced. Some Charhounds have moved from their previous spawn locations to new ones on the edges of Kingsgate.
* More mushrooms should be available at any given time for Stillmoor PvP dailies.
* Whitefall – Escalation: Fixed a bug where you would occasionally not get points for a stone at your base.

CLIENT
* Increased client stability and optimizations.
* RIFT’s taskbar icon will now flash when any message box – such as ready checks or Warfront queues – pops up.

Happy 6 Month Birthday Rift #RiftGame

Ah, Port Scion. It’s a very neat messy warfront that I did for the first time yesterday. A confusing mass of bodies flying everywhere, plus mobs making it all the more fun. It seems that more often then not when it comes to pvp the groups I’m in are constantly being outdone by the guardians – but it’s still fun, and I still partake. Every so often I’ll be on the winning side of a match even if it doesn’t happen too often.

Today marks the beginning of Rifts 6 month anniversary festival. I’m happy for Trion, I think that in today’s volatile game market to be going so strong after six months is quite a feat. I can’t speak for all servers but mine is quite busy, there are players everywhere on both Guardian and Defiant sides of the fence, warfronts pop up frequently no matter what level I tend to queue at, and over all I feel a lot of ‘life’ in the game while playing.

Yesterday I started leveling up my mage, who is now 19. In most games I play I tend to want a ranged dps character as opposed to a melee type, and I’m already feeling that I may switch from cleric to mage if I get to level 50 on the new character. We’ll see how it goes though. This weekend I will no doubt be grinding T2 dungeons in hopes of extra plaques so that I can finish off my T2 gear set. I hope everyone else has a fantastic weekend, no matter what game they find themselves in!

As always, happy gaming!

GU61 Patch Notes #EQ2

FEW IMPORTANT THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT!

  • The reitemization means that the following things are going to occur:
  • All of your items are going to become UNATTUNED.
  • Any item that you are wearing at the time of this update *that has adornments on it* will have those adornments popped off and returned to your inventory. (You can put them right back on afterward, if you so desire.)
  • Because of the AA revamp, *all AA points are reset*. Thus, you should plan a bit of time to reassign your AA points after this update.
  • We are excited to bring you the Plane of War raid, but since the raid progression has not yet been completed by players to allow access to that raid, we’re going to take advantage of that situation to keep the door locked for a week to give it a bit more polish.
  • The Dungeon Finder feature scheduled for GU 61 is slightly delayed. It will become available ASAP after it sits on Test for a week or so.

PLANE OF WAR

  • The time is near for the great Fortress of Drunder to reveal its true purpose to all. The very bedrock of the Eastern Wastes shudders as a massive portal rips itself open within the fortress walls. The sounds of battle echo through its halls as the God of War himself prepares his innumerable armies to march across the frozen face of Velious and seize control of the lands of Norrath for all eternity.  Are you ready to face Rallos Zek himself?
  • Prove your mettle against the Children of War to enlist their aid in battle as you leave the mortal world behind and face a god himself in the Plane of War!
  • The Plane of War is a normal and challenge mode raid.
  • Elements of War is a normal and challenge mode heroic experience.

DYNAMIC DUNGEONS

Two new dynamically scaling dungeons have opened up in the Sinking Sands.  These dungeons automatically scale to your party between levels 60 and 90.  The entrances can be found using the door to Silent City and the newly added genie’s lamp directly next to it.

The Palace of Sabaron
Sabaron’s Palace is the home of a mad Djinn who believes that by using his power and the power of a newly discovered artifact, the Tear of Anashti, he can raise an army of Sul’Dal to march on the Plane of Air and take it over for Djinn to rule.  His palace is full of undead evils he has resurrected as well as his most trusted attendants.

Silent City: The Delving Dead
The dead within the halls of the Silent City are restless after lifetimes of slumber, as if roused by an unseen hand.  Ancient overseers crack whips as the undead hordes delve deep into hallowed soil.  They labor tirelessly, endlessly searching for an ancient artifact of great power.

BEASTLORD PRELUDE EVENT #1

  • Strange spiritual energies have emerged within Antonica and Commonlands.  A few spiritual-attuned individuals have felt this new energy, like gentle ripples on the surface of a calm lake.  What might this new power be, and what secrets might it hold for the future of Norrath?  Interested adventurers should seek out either Caalina, who can be found in Antonica outside the gate to North Qeynos, or Elmin, who has begun his investigation near the city gates to Freeport in Commonlands.

HOUSE RATING SYSTEM

  • You can now publish your house to be rated against fellow decorators!
  • The ‘Housing Leaderboards’ window can be accessed through the EQII menu or by using the /house_ratings command.
  • Use the ‘Publish / Unpublish’ button on your house’s door menu to add / remove your house from the leaderboards window.
  • You cannot place or move items in a published house.
  • Unpublishing your house will reset its rating, but it won’t reset any awards you have obtained.
  • Visit homes on the list and let the owners know what you think.
  • You may rate a house once per account.  You may re-rate a house as often as you like but only the last rating will be kept.
  • Houses will earn awards each day for their position on the leaderboard.
  • Houses can eventually enter the Hall of Fame when they earn enough awards.

YouTube VIDEO CAPTURE

  • The ability to capture video and upload it to YouTube.com has been added.  Note: 4GB of system memory is recommended when using the video recording feature.  Systems with less than 4GB of memory may experience a decrease in performance when using this feature.
  • The Video Capture Window is now hidden by default (use the default hotkey Alt+y to toggle it).
  • After recording video, a file called EQ2VideoCapture.avi will be placed in your root install directory.  If you record a second video it will overwrite this file.
  • A UI window to upload your video to YouTube.com will appear after recording video.
  • Video Capture Options/Settings:
  • Hotkey can be changed under Controls – Window Keys – Video Capture Window
  • Output quality can be set under User Interface – Video Capture

GENERAL

  • Fixed a bug where you could select an invalid race during character create.
  • You can now use the /sitchair emote while on top of objects to make your character appear to be sitting on them.

USER INTERFACE

  • The weapon stats in the character window will now update when your character’s combat stats change.
  • Fixed a bug with how multi attack and spell weapon multi attack were displaying in the default UI.

PLAYER HOUSING

  • You can now own up to 20 houses!

POPULATION / ZONE PROGRESSION

  • Sages within Norrath (Lorekeeper Drelin in Thurgadin, Navarius Orvalis in North Freeport, Ricka Stonehide in New Halas, Indis Surion in South Qeynos) now count the Destiny of Velious heritage quests towards earning heritage titles.
  • Faydwer drakes, such as the Emerald Drakes, now count towards the Drakota Lore and Legend quest.

Heroic Content

  • Mobs casting beneficial crit debuffs such as Whispers of War, can no longer cast these spells when they are charmed. Specifically in Kael Drakkel contested, as Whispers of War was adding hate to mobs around the charmed NPC.

All expansion 7 x4 raid zones

  • NPC’s will no longer gain any strikethrough from their unbridled series buffs.  The amount of base strikethrough that such mobs have has been reduced.

Great Divide / Eastern Wastes

  • A Token of Coldain Loyalty can now be purchased from the Coldain faction merchant once your character has reached +40,000 faction. This token can be traded to any alternate characters on your account and will set that alternate character to +40,000 faction.
  • A Token of Ry’Gorr Loyalty can now be purchased from the Ry’Gorr faction merchant once your character has reached +40,000 faction. This token can be traded to any alternate characters on your account and will set that alternate character to +40,000 faction.
  • These tokens must be purchased at the rate of one per alternate character and are one charge only.

Great Divide

  • Fertilizer corpse loot should be a bit more common.
  • The thieving gnomish pirate, Monstrous Beasty, and Warwolf Matriarch, triggered by solo quests in Great Divide, are no longer immune to control aspects. [Fan Faire Request]

Eastern Wastes

  • Fertilizer corpse loot should be a bit more common.
  • All of the flying accessible harvestables in Eastern wastes are obtainable once again.


All Drunder x4 raid zones

  • Damage from AOE spells for many of the bosses in the x4 drunder raid zones (non-challenge) is now somewhat easier to mitigate.

Drunder x4 Challenge mode raid zones

  • The Greater Arctic Rage buff package now grants npcs 240% crit bonus instead of 280%.


Temple of Rallos Zek heroic [Challenge]

  • The effect of falling rubble will now line up when damage is being dealt.

Shard of Love

  • Level 90 players will now correctly have a chance to gain items from WIllowmeena’s rare loot table in Shard of Love.

Tower of Frozen Shadow

  • De’manti Sheda within the fear cage should now be able to be respawned if he defeats the raidforce.
  • Dark widows within the fearcage event should no longer reset the encounter when they run away from players.
  • Frightful Shadowbones within the fearcage event should no longer reset the encounter when they run away from players.
  • Condensed Shadows that spawn during the Tserrina encounter should no longer cause the encounter to reset if they cannot find a valid target.

Tower of Frozen Shadow: Shadowed Corridors

  • Spectral Librarian Emiida in Tower of Frozen Shadows: Shadowed Corridors should now correctly award the sense of urgency achievement.

Crystalline Breaks

  • Some of the mobs within Crystalline Breaks now detect stealth and/or invisibility.

Greater Faydark

  • There is now a mailbox in the Nursery in Greater Faydark. [Fan Faire Request]

Sullon’s Spire [Challenge] x4 raid

  • The damage done by many boss spells has been reduced.  The amount of health of most adds during boss fights have been reduced.  The range of some of Ragebourne Gregor Haldane’s AOE spells has been greatly reduced.  Gregor Haldane’s clone no longer has cooperative strike.  Hragold the Frenzied summons 6 adds per wave rather than 8.
  • Ragebourne Gregor Haldane: His seething strike and ragecloud spells no longer combo causing focus damage.

Vallon’s Tower x4 raid zone

  • Various fights have been toned down to make them easier, and more in line with the rewards for this zone.
  • Multiple groups zoning in should now all end up in the same instance of this zone.

Temple of Rallos Zek: Foundations of Stone [Challenge]

  • Statue of Rallos Zek fight: Greater warboars should no longer taunt lock the main tank group.  Warboars and Automaton of Escalation have less health.

Demitrik’s Bastion

  • The Contraption Cogwinder (rare spawn named) should no longer fall through the world and be unable to be killed.

Citadel of V’uul

  • Difficulty has been brought down overall for Citadel of V’uul x2.
  • Bosses strikethrough and AOE auto attack percentages have been lowered significantly.
  • Arch Confessor Aytali’s difficulty has come down overall.

ABILITIES / ALTERNATE ADVANCEMENT
General

  • AA selections that are not currently available for purchase will display in grayscale.
  • Spell autoattack (Priest/Mage) will turn on automatically when you cast a damage spell on a target.
  • Fixed a bug where some spells could become “stuck” and wouldn’t be castable until you zoned or logged.
  • Added Spell Weapon versions of flurry, multi attack, pvp multi attack, ae autoattack, haste and dps for spell weapons.
  • All deity pets now grant increases to all attributes.

Player Statistics Updates

  • Many stats now provide additional benefits to other stats!  See below for details:
  • Having parry skill over the level cap now gives a bonus to uncontested parry and uncontested riposte.
  • Having defense skill over the level cap now gives a bonus to uncontested dodge.
  • Having haste over the cap now gives a bonus to flurry.
  • Having weapon skill over the cap now increases your minimum damage amount making it closer to the maximum amount.
  • Having weapon skill over the cap now gives a bonus to riposte damage.
  • Having spell and combat art skills over cap now increases the minimum damage of those spells and combat arts making it closer to the maximum amount.
  • DPS is now a rating that translates into the actual increase to your melee damage with no cap. Mouse over the DPS stat in your persona window to see the actual percent increase to your damage.
  • Having spell casting speed over the cap now gives you a slight bonus to double cast spells.
  • Multi Attack is now a rating rather than a straight percent chance for additional attacks.  Mouse over the Multi Attack stat in your persona window to see how many extra attacks you get, and your chance for an additional attack on top of those.

Alternate Advancement Revamp

  • Subclass Alternate Advancement trees have been reformatted. The connections have been removed and the tree is now formatted in rows. The first row contains four abilities and requires no points spent to access. The second row contains five abilities and requires five points spent in the Subclass Tree to access. The third row has six abilities and requires ten points spent in the Subclass tree to access. The fourth row has six abilities and requires 15 points spent in the Subclass tree to access. The fifth row is the endlines – now known as Expertise abilities. These abilities unlock every 20 points spent in the Subclass tree above them. At 20 points spent, you can select one Expertise ability. At 40, 60 and 80 points spent, additional Expertise abilities can be purchased.
  • The Shadows Alternate Advancement tab now unlocks at level 50.
  • The Sentinel’s Fate Alternate Advancements now unlock at level 80.
  • The Heroic Alternate Advancement tab now unlocks at level 80.

Assassin

  • Enhance: Torture now also improves the amount of mitigation reduced by Torture.
  • Enhance: Sinister Strike now also improves the Crit Bonus of Sinister Strike.
  • Enhance: Exacting will modify Exacting to increase all of its affected abilities’ Crit Bonus while Exacting is active.

Bard

  • Vanishing Act is now Dodge and Cover. Dodge and Cover no longer grants stealth to the group and no longer dispels on a block, parry, riposte or when damage is tanking. It grants 100% Dodge Chance to each member of the group for 15 seconds and dispels when the dodge applies.
  • Lend Shielding now lasts for 5 seconds, no longer requires a round shield and does not dispel when the target blocks. It now has a 60 second reuse and the range has been increased to 35 meters.
  • Skald’s Defense no longer requires a round shield. The Multi-Attack is now 1% per rank.
  • Heroic Storytelling now reduces noxious and arcane damage to group members by 3%. The group has a 10% chance to resist Stifle effects.
  • Round Bash no longer requires a shield.
  • Intoxicating Notes now triggers on any hit.


Berserker

  • Enhance: Berserk Rage and Enhance: War Cry have been merged into Enhance: Berserk.
  • The Alternate Advancement “Berserk” now applies to the group and stacks with other forms of Berserk.  The damage per second and attack speed values have been increased.
  • Focus: Destructive Rage now applies correctly to the PvP Multi-Attack Chance.
  • Cyclones now also the casting speed of area effect combat arts.
  • Gut Roar now absorbs all physical damage for 3 seconds and casts in 0.25 seconds.
  • Perseverance now triggers when the Berserker falls below 50% health and grants a low chance to Stoneskin physical attacks after it triggers.
  • Enhance: Weapon Counter now also improves the Crit Bonus of Counterattack.
  • Enhance: Open Wounds now also improves the Crit Bonus of Open Wounds.
  • Enhance: Rampage now also improves the Crit Bonus of Rampage.
  • Enhance: Chaos now also adds Elemental, Noxious and Arcane mitigation to Chaos.
  • Enhance: Vision of Madness also applies damage reduction while Madness is active.

Brigand

  • Enhance: Shank has been added to the Brigand Advancement tree.  It increases Shank’s damage by 5% per rank.
  • Enhance: Sneak now also improves Stealth movement speed while Sneak is active.
  • Enhance: Shadow Slip now also improves the threat reduction amount of Shadow Slip.

Bruiser

  • Enhance: Eye Gouge has been added and increases the damage of Eye Gouge by 3% per rank.
  • Enhance: Indomitable Will’s final rank will grant the ability to cure elemental effects.
  • Enhance: Stone Deaf now also reduces the power cost of Stone Deaf.
  • Enhance: Close Mind’s final rank will cause Close Mind and Brutal Inspiration to cure hostile control effects on termination.
  • Enhance: Feign Death’s final rank grants a chance to override a failed Feign Death, increasing the success rate.

Cleric

  • Wondrous Buckling is now Wondrous Distraction and no longer requires a buckler.
  • Turn Undead is now Divine Demonstration and no longer requires the target to be undead.  The damage has been substantially reduced.  The reuse time is now 45 seconds.
  • Blessed Armament now procs Cleanse instead of Cleanse Undead.  It now scales at 10% trigger chance per rank and deals about half the damage of Bolt of Power.  It now triggers off of any attack and no longer requires the target to be undead.
  • Protection from Undead is now Exorcize.  Exorcize reduces the potency of heals and lasts until cancelled.  It requires a small amount of power every 6 seconds to pulse divine damage to up to four targets near the cleric.  The cleric must be hated by at least one target within 7.5 meters for the pulse to trigger.

Coercer

  • Brainshock now applies the powertap instantly, allowing the spell to be maintained on multiple targets.
  • Hastened Mana’s final rank adds an additional trigger to Mana Cloak.
  • Enhance: Channel now also causes Channel to instantly restore a small amount of power to the group as the Channel occurs.

Conjuror

  • Enhance: Fiery Magician, Enhance: Aery Hunter and Enhance: Earthen Avatar have been merged into Enhance: Summon Spells.
  • Enhance: Roaring Flames and Enhance: Aqueous Swarm have been removed.
  • Unabate is now passive and persists through deaths.
  • Fire from Within now grants PvP Potency.
  • Enhance: Summoning improves the primary pet’s mitigation to all damage.
  • Enhance: Vehement Skin now also reduces the power cost of Vehement Skin.
  • Enhance: Shard of Essence now also grants power instantly to the target of the shard.

Crusader

  • Knight’s Stance can no longer apply to the Crusader’s ranged weapon.
  • Legionnaire’s Conviction now has a two minute reuse time.

Defiler

  • Curseweaving now improves durations by 20%.
  • Enhance: Voice of the Ancestors now also improves the radius of Voice of the Ancestors.

Dirge

  • Enhance: Shroud now also improves Stealth movement speed while Shroud is active.
  • Enhance: Garsin’s Funeral March now also improves the resistibility of Garsin’s Funeral March.
  • Enhance: Jael’s Dreadful Deprivation now also improves the Crit Bonus of Jael’s Dreadful Deprivation.
  • Enhance: Lanet’s Excruciating Scream now also improves the Crit Bonus of Lanet’s Excruciating Scream.

Druid

  • Calm Animals is now Calm.  It now mesmerizes any non-epic single target, rather than animals.  The reuse is now 45 seconds and it scales from 10.6 second duration to 19.8 second duration. In PVP Combat, the duration scales from 3.5 seconds to 6.6 seconds.
  • Charm Animal is now Charm Creature.  It now charms any target that is not immune to charms.  The duration is now 4 minutes 24 seconds at rank 1 and scales to 8 minutes 15 seconds at rank 10.  In PVP, the duration scales from 3.5 seconds to 6.6 seconds and the spell is a mesmerize.

Enchanter

  • Quickening no longer requires a one-handed weapon.
  • Counterblade has had its damage increased.
  • Dreamweaver’s Trance now also increases Disruption.
  • Daydream now inflicts damage over time.
  • Hypnosis is now Dreamweaver’s Trance and grants an augmentation allowing the Dreamweaver to have a chance to mesmerize any enemies attacking them with a melee weapon for a short duration.

Fury

  • Enhance: Root has been removed.
  • Kudzu now lasts for 4 seconds in PVE and has a 25% chance to break on damage, instead of 100%.
  • Enhance: Fae Fire now also improves the Crit Bonus of Fae Fires.
  • Enhance: Feast now also improves the resistibility of Feast.
  • Enhance: Thunderbolt now also improves the Crit Bonus of Thunderbolt.


Guardian

  • Enhance: Sentinel and Enhance: Taunting Blow have been removed.
  • Enhance: Rescue now also improves the range of Rescue.
  • Enhance: Sentry Watch now also improves the radius of Sentry Watch.
  • Enhance: Tower of Stone now also reduces the power cost of Tower of Stone.
  • Enhance: Guardian Sphere now also improves the duration of Guardian Sphere.
  • Enhance: Reinforcement’s final rank will allow Reinforcement to trigger when the Guardian uses a hostile spell, such as a taunt.


Illusionist

  • Split Personality is now Illusionary Instigation.  It lasts for 20 seconds and grants 20% Strikethrough, 20% Hate Gain and 20% to the size of the target’s taunts.  It casts in 0.25 seconds and has a 90 second reuse.
  • Enhance: Personae Reflection now also improves the reflection’s maximum health.
  • Enhance: Phase’s final rank applies a short duration stun and knockdown when Phase is cast.


Inquisitor

  • Enhance: Tormenting Conversion and Enhance: Incarcerate have been removed.
  • Enhance: Resurrections now also improves range and radius of resurrection spells.
  • Enhance: Act of War now improves the damage of Act of War rather than the trigger chance.
  • Enhance: Fervent Faith now applies a short duration in combat run speed increase following the cast of Fervent Faith.


Monk

  • Enhance: Will of the Heavens has been merged into one Alternate Advancement with three ranks.  It now reduces the reuse time by 10 seconds per rank.  The final rank adds the ability to cure Trauma effects.
  • Enhance: Silent Threat and Enhance: Challenge have been merged into Enhance: Taunts.
  • Reprimand has been added as a new Expertise ability.  Reprimand is a taunt with a 24 second reuse, 35 meter range and 0.25 cast time.
  • Combination now fires automatically when a punch, jab and a kick have been used in quick succession.  It now only hits once.
  • Enhance Jab: Waking Dragon also improves the Crit Bonus of Waking Dragon.
  • Enhance Jab: Five Rings now also improves the Crit Bonus of Five Rings.
  • Enhance Jab: Silent Palm now also improves the Crit Bonus of Silent Palm.
  • Enhance: Tsunami will now also improve the damage of Ripostes while Tsunami is active.
  • Slightly increased the time allowed to Complete Combination.
  • Provoking Stance now adds threat positions to Reprimand.


Mystic

  • Resurrection Haste has been merged into Resurrection Range.
  • Resurrection Cycles has been merged into Resurrection Efficiency.

Necromancer

  • Mortality Mark now correctly increases the caster’s mitigation, not the target’s.
  • Enhance: Grim Sorcerer, Enhance: Undead Knight and Enhance: Nightshade have been merged into Enhance: Summon Spells.
  • Beyond the Grave now grants PvP Potency.
  • Enhance: Summoning improves the primary pet’s mitigation to all damage.
  • Enhance: Dark Heart now also grants power instantly to the target of the heart.
  • Enhance: Chains of Torment now also improves the resistibility of Chains of Torment.
  • Enhance: Grasping Bones now also improves the resistibility of Grasping Bones.
  • Enhance: Consumption now also improves the Crit Bonus of Consumption.

Paladin

  • Smite Evil now works against Rangers, Illusionists, Monks and Templars.
  • Enhance: Lay on Hands now also reduces the power cost of Lay on Hands.
  • Enhance: Devout Sacrifice now also reduces the power cost of Devout Sacrifice.
  • Enhance: Demonstration of Faith now also applies an arcane mitigation reduction to any enemy striking the target of Demonstration of Faith.
  • Enhance: Intercept now also heals the target when Intercept expires naturally.

Predator

  • Smoke Bomb now inflicts moderate poison damage and no longer clears the enemy’s target or reduces threat.  The amount of threat positions reduces has been increased to 2 positions.

Ranger

  • Befriend Animal has been removed.
  • Enhance: Snaring Shot now also improves the Crit Bonus of Snaring Shot.
  • Enhance: Escape now also reduces the power cost of Escape.

Rogue

  • Opportunistic Cover no longer requires a round shield.  It now grants 2.5% Damage Per Second per rank.

Shadowknight

  • Enhance: Soulrend has been added and increases the damage of Soulrend by 5% per rank.
  • Unholy Concentration has been added as a new Expertise ability.  Unholy Concentration passively grants 15% strikethrough to the Shadowknight.
  • Enhance: Mortal Embrace’s final rank grants a chance to override a failed Feign Death, increasing the success rate.
  • Enhance: Shadow Coil now also improves the duration of Shadow Coil, causing damage to apply faster.
  • Enhance: Devouring Mists now also improves the resistibility of Devouring Mists.
  • Enhance: Tap Veins now also improves the Crit Bonus of Tap Veins.
  • Enhance: Devour Vitae now also improves the Crit Bonus of Devour Vitae.
  • Enhance: Doom Judgment now also improves the Crit Bonus of Doom Judgment.
  • Enhance: Mana Sieve now also improves the Crit Bonus of Mana Sieve.
  • Enhance: Death March now also adds Strength to On the March.
  • Pools of Blood now also improves Maximum Health.
  • Pooling Blood now also improves the Maximum Health of Pools of Blood.

Sorcerer

  • Concussive Blast now inflicts minor magic damage and stuns all of the affected targets for 1.5 seconds.

Summoner

  • Animated Dagger is now a direct damage spell that inflicts piercing damage.
  • Parrying is now Theurgistic Prowess and increases the summoner’s subjugation, ordination, focus, disruption and ministration.
  • Implode is now Theurgist’s Detonation. Theurgist’s Detonation inflicts magic damage around the summoner.
  • Cabalist’s Cover now applies a 20% chance to prevent magical damage from the pet to the caster.  It no longer allows the pet to avoid melee attacks for the caster.
  • Perceptor’s Bodyguard no longer requires the pet to be a fighter.  The amount has been reduced to 1% health per rank.
  • Animist’s Transference is now Transference and is in the Cabalist line.
  • Magic Leash is now in the Animist line and no longer requires a mage pet.  If the pet is a fighter, it will taunt the entire encounter.  If the pet is not a fighter, it will detaunt the encounter.  The fighter pet has a chance to improve its hate position as well.
  • Shadowstep is now in the Magician line and no longer requires a scout pet.  It now inflicts magic damage and if the pet is a scout or a fighter, they will teleport to the target.
  • Minion’s Uproar is now in the Magician line and displays the exact effects.
  • Perceptor’s Command is now Perceptor’s Parry and increases the uncontested parry of the pet.
  • Shockwave can now trigger on any hit and can be triggered with any pet.
  • Unflinching Servant can now be used on any pet.
  • Animist’s Bond is now Animist’s Evasion and reduces the caster’s threat position by 24.  The reuse is 3 minutes.
  • Minion’s Barrier is now Minion’s Attention and grants a proc that has a chance to increase threat position if the pet is a fighter and reduce threat position if the pet is a priest, scout or a mage.
  • Minion’s Uproar has been replaced by Symbiosis.  If the pet is a fighter, the summoner transfers some of their threat to the fighter.  If the pet is a mage, priest or scout, the pet transfers some of their threat to the summoner.
  • Focused Minion is now Symbiotic Bond.  It increases the amount of Symbiosis by 1% per rank.
  • Minion’s Zeal is now Teamwork and is the Cabalist line’s endline ability.  The scout pet grants 10% Multi Attack and PvP Multi Attack, the fighter grants a 20% chance to reduce incoming damage by 30%, the Ooze and Hydromancer pets grant 5% maximum health and the mage pet grants 5% Potency and PvP Potency.
  • Arcane Minion now works on all primary pets.
  • Cabalist’s Aura now improves the max power, max health, Potency and PvP Potency of Beyond the Grave and Fire from Within.
  • The Cabalist line’s third ability is now Cabalistic Conversion.  It reduces the group’s power cost by 1% per rank.
  • Empower Servant is now granted when purchasing Possess Minion and the heal and power refresh are attributed to the summoner.
  • Reanimate is now in the Magician line and has been changed into a death prevention on the pet. The new version lasts until cancelled or triggered, has one trigger, a 0.5 second casting time and a five minute reuse. When triggered, the pet will be healed to full and have its threat cleared.

Swashbuckler

  • Enhance: Inspired Daring now also improves the Crit Bonus of Daring Attack.
  • Enhance: En Garde now also improves the Crit Bonus of Counterattack.
  • Enhance: Sneak now also improves Stealth movement speed while Sneak is active.

Templar

  • Enhance: Sooth has been removed.
  • The second Enhance: Involuntary Gift advancement is now Enhance: Involuntary Gift II.
  • Divine Reckoning now improves hostile spell damage rather than reuse.

Warden

  • Shatter Infections now lasts for 8 seconds, has a 35 meter radius and cures all effects on anyone in the group who receives a hostile spell.
  • Enhance: Undergrowth now also improves the agility reduction of Undergrowth.
  • Enhance: Tranquility now also improves the Crit Bonus of Tranquil Healing.

Warlock

  • Vacuous, Enhance: Nullify, Enhance: Concussive and Enhance: Nullmail have been removed.
  • Plaguebringer should now stack when more than one warlock uses it on the same target.

Warrior

  • Unshakable Grip can now be cast while moving.

Wizard

  • Enhance: Vital Transfer and Enhance: Harvest Mana have been removed.
  • Frigid Gift now lasts for 24 seconds.
  • Enhance: Frigid Gift now adds 1 second to the duration per rank.
  • Fireshape now modifies Surge of Ro to convert all magic and cold spells to heat, rather than being its own spell.
  • Iceshape now modifies Frigid Gift to convert all magic and heat spells to cold, rather than being its own spell.

TRADESKILLS

  • Stats on many tradeskill items have been reitemized.
  • The Far Seas Alchemical Requisition 54 (Rush Order) writ now correctly indicates that the quest giver wants Raging Blow V and not Raging Blow IV.
  • Harvesting abilities can now only be modified by direct means, so only harvesting tools or racial abilities should affect them.  Casting speed will no longer modify them.  Harvesting and tradeskill skills will no longer be modified when mentoring.
  • There is now a Rare Harvest Chance stat for tradeskillers. This is the chance to get a bonus rare harvest in addition to the normal harvest rewards from a harvest node.
  • Tradeskilled Battleground Jewelry and Armor bags can now be traded and sold on the broker.
  • Carpenters can now make some stone textured room dividers, and a wider variety of floor tiles to match their room dividers. [Fan Faire Request]

Tradeskill Alternate Advancement Abilities

Crafting classes now have their own alternate advancement tab to spend AA on.  This AA is earned through the normal course of gameplay when crafters do crafting quests.
Details:

There are three rows of abilities.

  • Each ability can have up to 5 points spent on it.
  • A maximum of 25 points can be spent in this tab.
  • Each row needs a minimum of 10 points in it to buy into the next level.

Level 1:

Ample Harvest: Each rank bought increases your chance to harvest a second time by 3%.
Swift Creation: Each rank bought increases your progress gained each round by 2%.
High Quality Materials: Each rank bought increases your durability gained each round by 2%.

Level 2:
Rapid Manufacturing: Each rank bought increases your progress by 2.
Resilient Materials: Each rank bought increases your durability by 2.
Effective Method: Each rank bought increase your success chance by 2%.
Advantageous Practice: Each rank bought increases your critical success chance by 2%.

Level 3:
Trim Reaver: Each rank bought increases your chance of harvesting a rare by 0.2%.
Conservation of Mass: Each rank bought increases your chance of not using materials when crafting an item.

ITEMS

  • All group/raid dungeon items have been reitemized except for Velious group/raid dungeons.
  • All overland zones have been reitemized.
  • Brand new loot has been added to many named creatures in outdoor zones!
  • Adornment descriptions will now indicate any restrictions based on weapon wield style or armor type.
  • Players who wish to procure the Scaleborn arena champion should seek out Ellywig Sprocketbaker in the Bonemire.
  • The Lodizal shell shield house item now hangs properly on the wall.
  • Fixed a bug where items wouldn’t inherit flags correctly from multiple addons.
  • Players should no longer receive an error that they already have one of the Coldain Rings equipped when they do not.

ACHIEVEMENTS

  • There are now achievements for both the Normal and Challenge versions of Throne of Storms: Hall of Legends.
  • There are now achievements for both the Normal and Challenge versions of Kraytoc’s Fortress.
  • The achievement “Escaping the Shadows” should now correctly update.
  • The achievement “Sense of Urgency: Escaping the Shadows” should now correctly update.
  • The achievement “Sense of Urgency: Spectral Librarian Emiida” should now correctly update.
  • The achievement “Flawless: The Curse is Broken” should now correctly update.
  • The achievement “Sense of Urgency: The Curse is Broken” should now correctly update.
  • The achievement “Shorthanded: The Curse is Broken” should now correctly update.
  • The achievement “The Curse is Broken” should now correctly update.

QUESTS

  • Thousands of new rewards have been added to hundreds of quests throughout Norrath!

Great Divide
Stormfeather’s Legacy!

  • With The Order of Rime pressing at the gates, the Goahmari are forced to find alternative ways to support Stormfeather’s Pride.  All god-touched that have completed Norbu’s training are being summoned to the village.  Seek out Hircus within the rookery to begin!


Fae / Arasai Flight!

  • Fae and arasai who are level 85 or higher in adventuring or tradeskilling may now work with scholar Aarne to learn more about the faefolk’s lost power of flight.

General

  • Dort Lumrick’s quest “A Page From Their Book” now updates for the entire group when the pirate thief is defeated, even if the player who kills the NPC does not have the quest.
  • If a group member that doesn’t have the quest Echoes of the Past kills a ptarmigan, all players in the group will receive a quest update.

Eastern Wastes
Rise of Thrael’Gorr!

  • The efforts of the Ragebourne within Kael Drakkel to free the Thrael’Gorr have been very successful with the aid of adventurers.  The result has allowed a once defeated clan to rise and seek a new home.  Ry’Gorr Clan Joiners are being summoned by the Ry’Gorr emissary within the Ry’Gorr Keep to continue their aid and bring hope to Clan Thrael’Gorr!

Kylong Plains

  • For the quest “The Domination of Phrotis” players should no longer be able to gate the quest by engaging the Will of Phrotis before they are needed to.

Crystal Caverns: Collapse

  • Coldain for the quest “Trapped Within the Crystals” should no longer run off until players have gotten the update for the quest.

Steamfont

  • Fixed a bug with the Material Support quest where the haywire clockwork spider would look like it was in combat when it was not.

Nektropos Castle

  • Players that have completed the quest “Whispers of Fortune” but have not spoken to Rikantus’s benign spirit within Nektropos Castle are now given the hint to return to Nektropos Castle. [Fan Faire Request]

Commonlands

  • Players wanting to do the quest “The Spread of Undeath” for the Rodcet Nife deity quest line can now enter a special instance of Befallen: Caverns of the Afflicted that does not scale.  This version of the zone will not offer a shard chest or collectables.

Iceshard Keep

  • Agent Provocateur: Players should no longer be able to receive a new mission from Provocateur Bas Darkfrost while locked out of the zone.

GUILD HALL AMENITIES

  • The guildhall Adventure Writ Agent amenity now offers Odus and Velious writs in addition to its prior Kunark writs.
  • Added tinkering and adorning recipes to the Guild Hall Tradeskill Recipe Salesman.
  • Fixed a bug where you could get an invalid amenity listed in your guild hall amenity list.

BATTLEGROUNDS

  • Fixed a bug where PVE crit bonus was being used in battlegrounds. Now PVP crit bonus will be used for all targets in a battleground.
  • Fixed a bug where NPC kills in a battleground were giving a player deathblow credit on the scoreboard.
  • Fixed a bug where NPC kills in a battleground were giving both the points for the NPC kill and points for a PC kill.
  • Call to Guild Hall no longer can be cast while in a Battleground.
  • Velious Discord faction can now be earned from all battleground matches.

PvP WARFIELDS

  • Warfields will no longer reward players for defeating one tower.

Getting my PvP On (and Other Fun) #RiftGame

I’m still waiting for GU61 to go live in EQ2, so I’ve been spending a lot more time then normal in Rift. Their 6 month anniversary kicks off tomorrow and yesterday evening was filled with so much in-game goodness that I almost forgot that’s how games are supposed to be. To start things off I decided that I would drop mining and pick up a second ‘main’ craft instead of having two harvesting classes. I went with Runecrafting, because I tend to win purples in dungeons a lot that I have no use for. I’d like to be able to break those down into useful bits. I spent the evening working on the craft, and found myself at 300 with very little trouble. Now my cleric has 300 Artifice / 300 Foraging / 300 Runecrafting. It also means that I can gain a second lure weekly, and opening more crafting rifts is always a good thing. Speaking of which, those re-set today, and I’m looking forward to spending my day hunting down crafting materials.

The second half of my evening was spent doing world PvP – in specific PvP Rifts located in Stillmoor. I decided against going with a pvp specific spec, and have been using my duracell spec + pvp gear. I seem to be handling myself just fine in world PvP, in Warfronts it’s hit and miss. I picked up three pieces of Cavalier gear yesterday which is T1 PvP gear basically, giving me some valor in order to be a little more resistant to player attacks. I earned 25,000 lifetime favour, which was a nice feat for myself, and gathered a few more achievements. I had forgotten to do my DRR, but I did my daily PvP quests which were quite fun.

I’m enjoying the way faction (notoriety) works in Rift. There are a LOT of factions and each one has a number of merchants who want to sell you goods based on how well known you are to them. Some of the major ones include Icewatch – they sell a head adornment I’m trying to get. There is a room off of the crafting room that includes a handful of faction merchants for each rift type. They sell all sorts of things like recipes, lesser planar essences, and lures to open the DRR. Oh, and of course little cute furry companion pets.

While it’s still true that most of what there is to do in Rift involves killing and slaughtering something, I have found the game at 50 quite a bit more enjoyable then it was grinding to 50. It doesn’t exactly make sense, because technically it is still grinding (faction, dungeons, pvp) but it feels different, a lot more fun – and that’s what matters. Speaking of – I managed another T2 run last night, although I forget which dungeon it was. I believe it was Runic Descent. I didn’t get any upgrades but I won a purple dagger no one wanted (which I broke into bits via runecrafting) and I earned plaques which is always nice. I’m about half way towards my T2 gloves, with any luck I’ll have them by the end of this weekend. I only like doing one or two dungeons at a time before moving on to something else, so it’s a bit of a slow grind for me.

As always, happy gaming no matter where you find yourself!

Nomadic Gamer