June 2003

By the way, we've been updating the Foundations section of the Herald all day - even if the site didn't answer your question yesterday, keep checking back.  And feel free to let me know via the feedback form (the "questions" form) if there's anything we need to add to the website!

Quests - Shrouded Isles - Hibernia

Fylara MacKiernan should now be giving the quest reward correctly on the final step of the Fylara's Armor quest.

World:

Players will now be able to use the portal ceremony on the Normal and Role-play servers to teleport the the front of their guild house in addition to their personal house.

The Teleporters in the capital cities and in Shrouded Isles on the PvE and PvP servers will also provide a teleport to a house owned by the players guild.

The medallion that is used for these teleports is as follows:
Medallion of Guild Hearth Passage - Guild House

The teleporters in Shrouded Isles on the Normal and Role-play servers will now teleport players to the front of their guild house or personal house.  The scrolls that are used for this are as follows:

Scroll of Hearth Passage - Personal House
Scroll of Guild Hearth Passage - Guild House

Please note, if you attempt to use either one of these without you or your guild owning the appropriate type of house, the scroll or medallion will be consumed and you will not be teleported.

The "Dye, Tincture and Enchantment Supplies" merchant purchased from the interior housing store should now have the correct supplies for tinctures, instead of potions.

~~ Back to top ~~

Read on for the things we've set to Pendragon to make housing easier on our testers:

"All houses on Pendragon have been wiped, and all lot auctions set to start counting down at 20 platinum.

In addition, to help the Pendragon regulars offset the cost of houses - a new merchant selling reduced cost house deeds has been added to each Marketplace

Soan in the Albion Housing Marketplace
Munn in the Midgard Housing Marketplace
Drere in the Hibernian Housing Marketplace

Please note that rent costs remain the same, and deeds purchased at the lot stones and regular merchants will cost the same as live servers.

Non-Pendragon regulars, please allow the regular Pendragon players to claim their house - and if you *must* try out a house, please take 5 minutes of your time and run to the back of the zone for your test house."

****

Sanya here - let me emphasize - use the Pendragon-only deed merchants for the reduced cost deeds.   The regular deed merchants still have the regular prices, and that is NOT a bug.

As the content producer says, we would very much appreciate it if people who just want to look at houses could set up housekeeping further away from the market square.  Thanks in advance for your consideration!

~~ Back to top ~~

Two more:

There are new quests in Darkness Falls.  These notes are for that, as well as a small bug fix that we ran today as a read file:

CLASSIC CAMELOT WORLD NOTES:

Quests- General:
There are rumors of a strange sickness spreading through the capital cities of all the realms.  The city guards claim these rumors are untrue, yet word around the inns claims otherwise.  Those interested in the truth should inquire there.

SHROUDED ISLES WORLD NOTES:

Midgard Quests:
Catla's Downfall:  Players should now receive the correct object and be stepped correctly when they interact with Catla.

~~ Back to top ~~

Please, PLEASE be careful:

People are offering to hold money for a group or a friend, trading that money to another person (or perhaps an alt on a second account), and then telling their friends and guildmates that "a bug ate the money."

This puts us in a tough spot.  If you gave someone money, and you both accepted the trade, it's done.  That's a valid trade, and we won't undo it.  We also can't tell third parties anything about another person's account.  So!  If your group lost money, all we can do is check to see if the money was traded or not.  If the money was traded, it is not a bug, and we will not reimburse anyone.  So please, be careful who you trust.

~~ Back to top ~~

By the way, before I get to the patch note (and once this patch note is tested it will be a READ FILE fix, not a server coming down fix, thank merciful heaven) - Lancelot is now accepting new guilds again.  Okay, on to the file being tested:

The teleporters in Shrouded Isles on the Normal and Role-play servers will now port players to the front of their guild house or personal house.  The scrolls that are used for this are as follows:

Scroll of Hearth Passage - Personal House
Scroll of Guild Hearth Passage - Guild House

Please note, if you attempt to use either one of these without you or your guild owning the appropriate type of house, the scroll will be consumed and you will not be teleported.

~~ Back to top ~~

Just a head's up, Pendragoners - tomorrow at 11:00 AM, we will be wiping the housing zones on Pendragon.  When we reopen the lots, the starting price for each lot will be lower, and the deeds will cost less than they do on live servers.  How much lower and how much less is still a hot topic of discussion, and we'll let you know as soon as we know.

~~ Back to top ~~

On Pendragon now:

======================================
Dark Age of Camelot
Version 1.63c Test Release Notes
Wednesday, June 25, 2003
======================================

NEW THINGS AND BUG FIXES

- Fixed a bug where permissions from one house would show the permissions from a previous house whose permissions were viewed, and then update the server with the invalid set of permissions.

- Fixed a bug where selling some stackable objects resulted in an erroneous message that the object was unsellable.  Crafters would have run into this problem more than any other class as they sell their stacks of converted studs, etc.  You can now sell these objects.

- Fixed a display problem where consignment merchants in housing zones would not show more than 37 items in their store list.  The objects were actually there, but they were not displayed.

- Fixed a couple of housing-related windows to better display long guild names.

~~ Back to top ~~

- LIVE:  The Staff of the Spiritualist (Midgard) now has the correct delay.

- LIVE:  The fix to the unused component fix has been fixed.  Translation - you can now convert the pre-1.63 components into new ones that can be sold.  However, you will not be able to sell stacks of components until tomorrow.  (See the Pendragon 1.63C notes.)

- PENDRAGON ONLY:  The portal ceremonies at Druim Ligen, Castle Sauvage, and Svasud Faste will now teleport players to just outside their guild's house.  Players will need to wear the Medallion of Guild Hearth Passage while standing on the teleport pad at the border keeps.   When the portal ceremony occurs, they will then appear in front of the guild house.

~~ Back to top ~~

Attention crafters - the problems with your high level bits are with studs, wires, strapping, and scales.  Everything else seems fine.  Please hang on to those four items, and wait for us to put up the fix.  It will require you to log out and download the fix, but we will not have to take the servers down.

Here are some notes we left out:

- In order to cut down on the size and number of graphical spell effects that are displayed (mostly in large-scale RvR battles), we've made it so that area-effect spells will now play a smaller version of the effect when they hit radius targets.  Please note that the original "full" effect still plays on the primary target of the spell; the smaller effects are now shown on characters that are inside the spell's effect radius.

- If a spell is resisted, the spell graphic effect will not play on the target creature/ player.   A white hand (the new spell resist graphic) will appear above the character's head to indicate the resist.

- You will now stop following your target upon death (instead of your body rotating around to still face the target while dead).

~~ Back to top ~~

These notes are on Pendragon right now, and we will be taking them live tomorrow morning:

- In the 1.63 patch notes, we said "We have added guild bounty point merchants to coincide with the bounty merchants in the capital cities and expansion starting cities.  The NPC names are as follows (insert list of names)." This note was a bit premature, and those merchants are not yet active.   To re-emphasize - you *currently* cannot use GBP to pay rent on the live servers, only Personal bounty points on a house that you personally own or a guild house where you are guild rank 0.

- The following housing decorations are incorrectly priced, and some time tomorrow, they will cost 10 gold apiece:

* The tall shrubbery garden item, currently 30 gold and 1x1.  
* The holly shrubbery garden item, currently 15 gold and 4x1.  
* A holly hedge, currently 20 gold and 4x1.

- Attention all crafters in possession of old straps, scales, studs, and wires:  we have a solution for you on Pendragon.  You will find in your crafting recipe list a new recipe, one that simply converts your unusable components and turns them into another component - one that will sell for 98% of the cost, as promised.  Please note these conversion recipes are temporary, and will not last forever.  So convert your old components as soon as possible, once this fix is live!

- Making hotbar buttons out of command window buttons should now work.

~~ Back to top ~~

Up until about an hour ago, the Foundations website had information that was outdated.  In the earliest housing design document, there were descriptions of the smallest cottages, whose language implied that they would be an incredible bargain, attainable by "mere peasants," etc.  These descriptions were old design ideas, that didn't make it past the alpha stage, but the housing website was based on that old, out of date design document.  We apologize for that.

Through interviews and discussions with players, we have been saying that housing was going to be something guilds and some individuals to be very proud of.  Our content producer has said "As a solitary player of the middle levels without tradeskills, the playtime invested to purchase and maintain your house would probably exceed what you are willing to invest.  Now, having said that - for a small guild of mid level players, it becomes much more feasible to think that a cottage is within your reach." At E3, we showed off grand guild mansions, and demonstrated all the features that make housing so special for groups of players - bindstones, meeting halls, Healers, portal merchants, etc.

But our own website had out of date information when it was compared to our message.  We have updated this information, and apologize to you.  Furthermore, we have heard your feedback and are keeping it in mind as we consider the future direction of Foundations and Dark Age of Camelot.

~~ Back to top ~~

Hey, everybody, got a list for you:

1) There will be a housing wipe on Pendragon later this week.  Details to come.

2) If you do not have a house, using the Housing Portal Scroll won't do anything but waste your ten silver for the time being.  Don't use it until you build a house!  We apologize for not making this clear and/or preventing its use without having a house.  We are working on the read file fix as I type this.  Sorry...

For the people whose next question is "well, how do I get to the housing zone, then!" the answer is "walk :)" The entrances are near the capital cities -

Albion:  "After you cross the Cotswold bridge toward East Camelot Gates, turn to your LEFT and proceed in a SOUTHWARD direction.  The player housing entrance will be on your right-hand side."

Hibernia:  "Just head out of Tir na Nog's NORTH Gate into Connacht and then turn DOWN the road heading to the SOUTHWEST and you'll see the entrance to Player Housing on the left-hand side."

Midgard:  "From Mularn's bindstone, head due EAST to enter Player Housing."

3) There looks to be a problem with a small number of salvage/crafted items, which is making them worth not nearly enough when you sell them back.  Don't sell any of that stuff (studs, bits, etc) until I post notes and fixes, okay?  I apologize for the inconvenience.

~~ Back to top ~~

We have decided to retire the Andred server.  It will happen in the next two months (with luck it'll be sooner rather than later).  We will be offering all Andred characters the opportunity to move to Mordred in some form or another.  I don't have much in the way of details right now, or else you'd see them here :) We will post the whole plan of action later - I'm posting today only to explain why Andred is not allowing a house purchase.  Thanks for all the feedback and suggestions on this issue, everyone.

~~ Back to top ~~

Good morning!  As we announced when we introduced the /level 30 incentive plan, we review the status of each realm on a regular basis.  As of this morning, we've decided to put Albion/ Bors back with all the other realms on the /level 20 list.  At this time, no other realms are in need of adjustment.

~~ Back to top ~~

It's going to be confusing in the new neighborhood at first - unless you're using our housing directory:  http://www.camelotherald.com/hdirectory/index.php

A few small details to keep in mind:

- The Directory updates on the hour, so please, if your heart is set on a particular lot, log into the game to be certain if it's available or not.

- You must "opt in" in order for your name to be listed (if you are a private homeowner).   For the time being, the command to opt in is also the command to display your trade skill level on the herald (we hope to have a specific command soon):  /webdisplay trade

- Guilds cannot opt out of the display, so if a house is turned into a guild house, it will appear on the directory automatically, just like the other listings here on the Herald.

We hope you find the Directory useful, and we'll see you in Foundations.

~~ Back to top ~~

EDIT 6:02 PM EDT - Changed some prices in response to feedback (those things are noted CHANGED).

First, a public service announcement:  We heartily recommend you get your hands, paws, or claws on Foundations and install it starting today - beat the rush!  On to the price list:

Now, the cost of your lot.  We're excited about our system, and we think you will be as well.  The challenge was to come up with a system that didn't favor those able to log in at a certain hour, that took into account the particular economy of a given server, and that allowed the lots to be worth whatever people were willing to pay.

What we've got is a reverse auction system - a system that takes all of the above into account.   Lots will start at 95 platinum each.  We expect that there will be very few takers at that price!  If a lot goes unpurchased for an hour, the price will come down.   If the parcel of land still remains unwanted, the price will drop still lower, and so on until someone decides the price is right (or the lot costs a single platinum piece - that's the minimum cost).

Once you have a lot, there are literally thousands of things you can buy.  Here are the prices for the "big ticket features":

Cottage deed, 1 platinum
House deed, 10 p
Villa deed, 40 p (CHANGED)
Mansion deed, 100 p

The rent costs per week of the houses are two percent of their initial cost, which works out to 20 gp, 200 gp, 800 gp, 2 pp in weekly rent based upon these prices.

All other items that you purchase will be priced as marked and will not have any upkeep costs.

Here are some of the things you can add to your home:

Porch deed, 500 gold (CHANGED)
Bindstone, 1 platinum
Vault, 1 p

Alchemy table, 1 p (CHANGED)
Forge, 1 p (CHANGED)
Lathe, 1 p (CHANGED)

Hastener, 100 gold
Smith, 100 g
Enchanter, 100 g
Emblemeer, 100 g
Recharger, 100 g

Healer, 3 platinum (CHANGED)

Consignment Merchant, 1 p
Grandmaster Merchant, 500 gold
Siege Merchant, 1 platinum (CHANGED)
Snowdonia, Druim Cain, or Vindsaul Faste Teleporter, 500 g

All other merchant and teleporter types - 100 gold

All other items, far too numerous to list here, are priced as marked on Pendragon.

Okay!  There it is - now head to Pendragon and test it out!

~~ Back to top ~~

The pricing document will come soon, just FYI :)

=======================================
Dark Age of Camelot
Version 1.63d Test Release Notes
Monday, June 23, 2003
=======================================

1.63d is a bug fix update to Dark Age of Camelot:  Foundations.  With this update, we've now fixed the last batch of bugs reported by our beta testers, and are ready to take Foundations live tomorrow morning (June 24) at 8:00 am.

~~ Back to top ~~

We have reset the character copier, so that everyone has another shot at copying their character to Pendragon.  Read on:

Yesterday, many people requested that their characters be copied to Pendragon.  The ones who got their requests in early were fine - but the people who had their requests in at the last minute may have run into problems.

As with all beta tests and all content on Pendragon, we may need to do wipes and/or character rollbacks.  Yesterday, we reset Pendragon to 2:00 PM EDT - and if your character was copied to Pendragon AFTER the time we rolled Pendragon back to, your character disappeared.  If you were affected by our time loop, I'm sorry.

So we've reset the copier, so the people affected can try again.  We do not anticipate any more rollbacks, although there will certainly be more housing wipes.  Of course, that's barring the unforeseen, etc.  We do what we have to do on the test server.

The copier will begin working at 2 PM - you may file your request for copy now, and the copier will handle requests in the order they were received.

If you've already played with the new content, and you don't want to test, please let others have a turn at getting a house lot after the next wipe.

Please read the housing manual here on the Herald (we linked to it several times in yesterday's patch notes) very carefully before you begin testing.  It has all kinds of information, such as how to find the housing zone, where to get the downloads you must have in order to test, and more.

We're glad you're having so much fun :)

~~ Back to top ~~

- The spellcraft merchant has been moved away from Alchemy Table in Dales of Devwy.

- The wintery dirges will no longer constantly drop the frozen teardrops

~~ Back to top ~~

Doh!  Check it out, crafters, these went up with 1.63B:

To help those Armorcrafters that may have vaults full of studs, strapping, wire, and scales, the sellback value of these items has been set so that you can get 98% of the cost to make them back.   It will still behoove you to try and use them up normally, but if you can't before the patch "goes live", you can sell them back to a merchant and get most of their cost back.

- Pendragon Only Bug:  Level values added to Shields and Thrown Weapons in the recipe delve window

- Pendragon Only Bug:  Fixed Weaponcraft to actually allow for material skill increases during weapon creation

- Pendragon Only:  Fixed the issue with all of the material skills, minus clothworking, scrolling, or adding extra pages, when opening up the various lists for the trinkets

- Pendragon Only:  Added level values to the delves of the various instruments made via fletching

- Pendragon Only:  Fixed issue with Albion Fluted Plate and Full Plate trying to use generic cloth for the material 10 recipes as opposed to the correct material 10 cloth

~~ Back to top ~~

Hey everyone - if you are a guild leader, have been logged in every day since just about forever, and yet still you got a "log in or lose your guild" letter from our automatic system - please disregard that letter and accept my apologies for the confusion.  For the explanation, read on:

Basically, we had something set wrong on the system.  In a guild with more than one person at rank zero, the system is supposed to look at ALL the rank zero accounts.  Even if only one rank zero is active, the system is supposed to be satisfied and go away.

We had it set the other way - if one of the multiple rank zeros was inactive, all the rank zero people in that guild would get a letter.  We have corrected this problem, and the system should be working now.  Sorry, y'all.

~~ Back to top ~~

Good morning, everybody, got some fresh read files for you:

Troll Mystics (aka future Bonedancers) starting in Vasudheim are now placed in the correct newbie guild.

We have fixed an issue on Gaheris where level 50 characters with a full experience bar were unable to turn in the Glowing Dreaded Seals for realm points.

~~ Back to top ~~

As the closed portion of the Foundations beta test draws near to the end, we'd like to thank our testers for all their help.  We'd also like to ask them to participate in a friendly contest.   Read on:

We've turned the trophy parts "Kill Me" NPC back on, and our decorative objects remain at their testing prices of two copper.  So put your two cents in and decorate your test houses, inside and out.  We're looking for examples of all four house sizes, and both interior and exterior design.

Mythic people will be lurking all weekend choosing the finalists.  On Monday morning between 9:00 and 11:00 AM EDT, we'll make the final selections and take screenshots.  The winning layouts will be announced to our testers, and appear on "splashscreens" (the images you see while a zone is loading) in the live release of Foundations.

So get ready, get set, and decorate to celebrate the end of closed beta testing!  Thanks again!

~~ Back to top ~~

Just a note to new members of our community - "read files" are things we fixed today without having to take the servers down.

Classic Camelot

Midgard:

We have fixed a problem in Muspelheim that could cause the Classic Camelot client to crash.

Hibernia:

Crafters doing consignment tasks in Tir Na Nog will no longer be told to deliver an item to an invisible mob.

~~ Back to top ~~

As many of you in the Camelot community are aware, soon after launch, we created a new concept in online role-playing games, that of a Team Lead.  Team leads are players who volunteer their time to act as advocates for specific in-game elements (such as classes, different server types, etc.).   They act as a conduit between Mythic and the game's community when it comes to specific issues relating to their position.  The program has been running for more than a year, and has been a great success.  Now, we've decided to make an already solid program even better.

First and foremost, in order to increase communication between the Team Leads and ourselves, we've created a producer-level position who is tasked with running the Team Lead program.  We've filled this position with Mike Lescault, an industry veteran (and more importantly, a Dark Age of Camelot veteran).  His day to day job will be to communicate with the Team Leads by passing their comments and questions on to the dev team, and then responding back to the TLs with answers.   He'll also be reading over their reports and logs and in general doing what needs to be done to make the team work more efficiently.

In light of this, we've made some changes to the Herald as well, to reflect the Team Lead's increasing importance to Dark Age of Camelot.  This link takes you to a page where you can see who the Team Lead is for each in-game item, and allows you to send them feedback.  It also lists any open Team Lead positions, and describes the criteria we look for when selecting new Team Leads.

~~ Back to top ~~

These notes are up on Pendragon right now:

=====================================
Dark Age of Camelot
Version 1.62b Release Notes
Monday, June 9, 2003
=====================================

BUG FIXES

Fixed an issue with Rapid Fire and Quickness/Mastery of Archery.  Previously a high quickness and/or Mastery of Archery realm ability would result in higher Rapid Fire damage than intended due to the way the timer was calculated.  Now Rapid Fire damage will scale down appropriately with the resulting decrease in draw time.

The bug fixed in version 1.62 regarding the "Number of Attackers" check in combat which fixed the block/parry bugs as well as bolt "in combat" issues had the side effect of making raid type encounters more difficult due to the extra accuracy which is now being used to decide who is attacking a target and who isn't.  Because this was not the intended result at all, we've switched around the way the attacker count check works to be more lenient in these situations.  A player will now remain counted as an attacker for a given target until he is added as an attacker for a new target or until his new "attacker timer" expires.  Note that healing or any other action which will add aggro will add you to the "Number of Attackers" list, not just damage.

~~ Back to top ~~

I am thrilled to introduce Julie Velez, the newest addition to the Mythic Communications team.   She's going to be camping one of the more populated message boards, and starting a new section here on the Herald.  But let's let her tell you about it:

Hello realm mates!

As you've heard I am the new addition to the Herald Team!  I'm really pleased to be in this position as it's something I have a lot passion about - community involvement.  Our goals for my portion of the Herald is to help give your heroic deeds and/or mortifying slaughter its due place in the annals of Herald history.

We want to hear about your raids and accomplishments, your triumphs, or even your defeat of epic proportions.  Basically what I'm saying is WE want to know, and we want to help you let others know!!  Use the form link (http://www.camelotherald.com/event.php)on the Herald to assist you in reporting these wondrous events to me.

Besides feature stories and tales of daring-do, we'd like to regularly congratulate you on your noteworthy personal events.  The form I just linked to has a category called "Congratulations."  Please use this link if you or a friend just made 50, or LGM status, or had an in-game wedding, and we'll add your character name to the next Scroll of Valor

Here are the rules and guidelines:

1) Items for publication should be submitted no later than a week after occurrence.   (Meaning recent news only, please!).

2) We will include links to your 'feature film' if you chose to make one, but sadly we cannot host them.  We will post up to three screenshots along with your story - we will contact you for them if we end up posting your tale.  See the form for more details.

3) You must include all pertinent information in the form; if you send in 'I killed the dragon', this probably will not get posted as a feature.  We are looking for newsworthy and creative tales of your deeds!

4) Profanity, vulgarity or anything equally offensive will not be published - although a little narcissism is always a common occurrence when expounding on your valor =P.  This is a G rated site in other words.

5) Not everything you submit will be posted, but we look forward to seeing all your "leads."

I cannot tell you how excited I am about having the having the opportunity to help spread the word about the great communities out there, and I really look forward to reading and sharing your moments of Triumph!

-Julie
The Herald Team

~~ Back to top ~~

We've just announced the Dark Age of Camelot:  Gold Edition, which bundles the original game, Shrouded Isles, and Foundations into one box.  It also includes a new player's guide (the "Newbie Guide") to the game as well as an updated manual.  Please note that Foundations is a free expansion - existing players will be able to download it, but new players who buy the Gold Edition won't have to download.

http://www.mythicentertainment.com/press/goldedition.html

~~ Back to top ~~

Hot wired to the game:

Classic Camelot:

Quests:

Hibernia:

"The Lost Relics" quest has been disabled for now.  Look for it in the next patch!

Items:

The Govannon Silvery Circlet (Hibernia) and the Radiant Spiked Shield (Midgard) should now have the correct bonus increases.

Shrouded Isles:

CHARACTER ISSUE:

Newly created Firbolg Foresters are now correctly placed in the appropriate 'newbie' guild.

Quests:

Midgard:

Berserker item turn in for Ota's Quest should now be turned on.

Albion:

Scurceol's Sturdy Belt should now be correctly fixed to be a WAIST item, not a WRIST item.

The Lost Stone of Arawn:

Ancient Copper Necklace - Two Important Notes!

One - This object wasn't set to be no-trade like its Midgard and Hibernian counterparts.   This will be corrected in the next patch, so be sure to put this object on the character you want it to stay with permanently before 1.63!

Two - Players might have logged in yesterday and noticed that the Ancient Copper Necklace's durability was reduced.  We fixed it so this won't continue to happen, and we will be adding a trade-in for the necklace in version 1.63 for those of you that have a bugged necklace now.   Until that time, please take your necklace to a smith for normal repairs and be assured you can trade it in to N'chever for a new one in the next patch.

~~ Back to top ~~

Two quick notes - first, in order to use the new /level command, you will need to log in your level 50 character.  You can log right back out, just pop in to get your account flagged by our system.  Second, be very, very careful using your respec.  Go slow, check your math, and don't submit until you're certain.  We hope you all are enjoying the freebies and the respec!

~~ Back to top ~~

Read on for the nitty gritty:

Shrouded Isles:

Dungeons:

The second entrance to Krondon works once again.

Quests:

Albion:

We have fixed a minor issue with the end of the Free the Rogue Quest.

The Ancient Copper Necklace should now be displaying right-click info again.

Arrows And Bladeturn

All three Archers now receive a new skill called "Penetrating Arrow", which allow them to penetrate (please add:  and break/pop the bubble), to some extent, Bladeturn spells.

- Please note that you cannot use Rapid Fire with Longshot or Volley.(please add or Crit Shot)

By the way, we had a little premature patching - one feature of Foundations will be a wall and floor trophy system, whereby you can turn some creatures that you kill into stuffed trophies.  Yes, you can mount those vicious pixies on slabs of oak with iron spikes through their wings.   Nasty creatures.  Oh, and dragon heads, too.

Anyway.  My point.  Part of the taxidermy system is that alchemists will make a preservation potion.  The recipes for those potions accidentally went live today (mistakenly copied from Pendragon to live.) You may have been able to make these potions for a limited time today - those potions are probably useless, the recipes may change, and whatever it cost you to make those potions today is subject to change.  We ran a read file to remove those recipes from live, so people logging in now shouldn't see the recipes any more.  Sorry, everyone.

Other than that - it was a really, really quiet patch day.  Thank you so much, Pendragon natives and team leads, for helping us get a huge patch live with so few issues.  It is much appreciated!

~~ Back to top ~~

From the 1.62 patch notes - Dark Age of Camelot will support "creating new mid-level (20th level) characters for those players who have attained 50th level on any character on any server.  In addition, we've flagged certain Realms on some servers as "under-populated" - on those Realms, if you are eligible to use the /level command, you'll be able to create a new 30th level character."

Below, you'll find a list of realms where the /level flag will be set to 30, instead of 20.   These are all realms that we have determined suffer from extraordinary population imbalances.   Read on:

We aren't going to publish the method for how we determine the line between the normal ebb and flow of a server and a true population imbalance.  There are several reasons for this decision, but one of the major ones is that we don't want to create a situation where people might be tempted to manipulate the system just to get free level 30s.  That's not a good idea for a number of reasons (not least being that it won't work - we're looking for statistical patterns, not simple temporary anomalies), so we will attempt to avoid the problem altogether.  The expected raft of new level 30 characters won't be enough to bump a server off the list either, by the way - we know that server population is not something that will be a quick fix.

Rest assured that many factors go into the decision to place a realm/server on this list.   We will continue to monitor server populations, and update the list as needed.  There is no "minimum" number of spots on this list, and indeed, we hope to see the day where this list has no entries but for Pendragon.

We are still discussing options for Andred.  Andred may appear on this list, or we may choose another option in regards to its population.  We are aware of the population problem on that server, though, and I don't want you to think we're ignoring it!

Side note - we know that many customers enjoy the battlegrounds, and plan to use the free characters as a means by which they can speed up their entry into these areas.  We would like to point out that a server with a decided population imbalance will not be the best one in which to seek a battleground experience.  We recommend going to a realm (that has not been designated as unbalanced) for /level 20 battleground action, or better yet, to Pendragon - a server that will always have the flag set to /level 30.

Thanks for reading!  And now, the list you've been waiting for.  In alphabetical order, players with at least one level 50 character may create level 30 alternate characters in the following realm/servers:

Bedevere - Midgard
Bors - Albion
Bors - Hibernia
Galahad - Hibernia
Galahad - Midgard
Gawaine - Midgard
Igraine - Midgard
Lancelot - Hibernia
Lancelot - Midgard
Merlin - Hibernia
Palomides - Hibernia
Palomides - Midgard
Percival - Hibernia

(This list will be located at http://www.camelotherald.com/realms/index.php.)

http://www.camelotherald.com/realms/index.php

~~ Back to top ~~