Launch Day - What’s New "Manifesto"

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Hello Realmers!  

 

First, thank you for your patience the last 2 months!  We started with a small idea, then it turned into a series of big ideas, each with a host of changes to test and bugs to fix.  

But we’re thrilled to announce a launch date for this Friday 11/24 at approximately 4 PM EST!  

 

If you’ve been following, you’re probably aware of some changes but let’s get them all in one big list for you to start theory crafting!  

 

Content:  

• Mabon’s Gamble (MG) will start with a level cap of 100

• The available above ground zones start at Ratling Run and provide a leveling and gearing progression ending at the Forest of Death.  

• The available dungeons at launch have all been rebalanced with new bosses and new loot and include:  Lesser Hive, Naktos Morgue, Faery Caverns, Targoth’s Tomb, Troll Hideaway and Forgotten Dungeon.  

• Dev note:  The intent here is twofold.  1)  Reduce 30 years of bloat on top of bloat and balance from a stable base.  2)  Reduce the world size to create more player interaction (No, not just PvP, even just seeing other players!)  

 

Mechanics:  Brace yourselves… 

• Mana:  Mana crystals have been replaced with Mana as a regenerating resource.  And yes, mana bananas are back!  

  • Your base mana pool is 5 MP per point of intelligence (25 intel = 125 MP)

  • You can increase your MP through gear.  This gear can be found as early as Ratling Run!  

  • The frequency of mana regen can be increased via Regeneration spell.

  • The potency of those mana regen ticks can be increased via Meditation skill. 

• *NEW* Mastery Points: As you use skills on MG you increase your mastery points associated with that skill.  Example:  100.0 skill points in Two-Handed Swords would increase your Melee Damage Modifier for two-handed swords by 100%. Mastery Points are capped by your skill level Grand Master=100.0, Master=80.0, Expert=60.0, Proficient=40.0, Familiar=20.0

• *NEW* Zone Event System:  Sporadically there will be a system wide message announcing a Zone Event.  The event will require the community to acquire a specific amount of experience, kills, or items in the designated zone.  Accomplishing this task as a community will be met with rewards!  

• Weapons:  We tinkered with these a bit and landed here…

  • Dexterity Only:  Throwing Dagger and Shortsword

  • Dexterity + Intelligence:  Dagger 

  • Dexterity + Endurance:  Unarmed

    • Dev note:  On MG claw weapons have a 1-square range but higher damage than shortswords and daggers.  We hope this combined with an endurance modifier for damage can create some new unique builds!

  • Strength + Intelligence:  Longsword

  • Strength Only:  All the 2-Handed Weapons

• Armor Mitigation:  Keep in mind, the damage reduction is based on which piece of armor gets hit.  If you wear cloth boots on your warrior, and you get hit in the boots, it’s going to hurt!

  • Cloth now reduces incoming damage by 5%

  • Leather now reduces incoming damage by 15%

  • Chain now reduces incoming damage by 25%

  • Plate now reduces incoming damage by 50%

 

Spells:

• Empower & Nimbility:  Let’s peel the bandaid here...these are not permanently enchantable on MG.  

  • Dev note:  We felt the ability to enchant these buffs up to 15 times limited design space and pushed players further into the “all one stat” builds.  There is A LOT more leveling gear on MG but no, you’ll not get 15 empowers (at least not in the level 1-100 base).  You’ll have to make choices.  Do you want more carrying capacity?  More movement?  More damage mitigation?  

• Light Dart & Wrath of God:  We found through testing the vs. evil damage modification was too OP.  This bonus has been reduced to make it more in line with other weaknesses (Example, using Flame Orb on a mob with weakness to fire)

• Mysticism:  For ‘crowd control spells’ like Hold, Stun, etc… “myst immunity” has been removed and replaced with a “shrugging” system.  

• Necromancy Summon Spells:  We’ve added a chance to “high roll” your summons based on either your strength or endurance.  This means, more diverse builds will get better summons results more frequently.  

 

Economy & Loot:  

• Gold:  Gold by intent will be hard to come by.  You’ll need to make some decisions about which spell books or armor you’re going to buy.  The intent here is to keep inflation down and keep gold elevated as a valuable resource.  

• Item Rarity:  Uncommon, Rare, etc items will drop with appropriately colored text.  

• Loot:  If we didn’t mention it yet, there’s TONS of new gear!  And plenty of the classics!  But new to MG server, some gear will require certain stats to wear.  Example:  Most chainmail armor will require a strength of at least 13 (this is your current strength, not your base strength).  

  • Dev Note:  This works for us thematically but it also allows us to create some unique gear for certain builds.  Example:  We can put more spell damage or mana on a piece of chain mail than a piece of cloth to help adventurers (who’ve historically struggled) while not constantly feeding that “all intelligence” build.  But can you cheese it a little with say, an Orc Wizard?  Yes and that’s amazing!  

• Item Power Level:  You won’t see your Amulet of Adventure or Helm of the Conqueror “buff every single stat” items… yet!  It’s important to realize that this is level 1-100 of potentially 1000 levels!  We’re all newbies!  In an effort to keep power creep in line going forward, the power level of most of the new items are significantly lower than what you see on DG.  But they’re in line with the power level of the content!  

 

Near Future:  

• Additional dungeons:  Tor's Crypt, The Labyrinth, Daemon Home and Holy Caves. 

• Character respec:  Learned Grandmaster Axe but found The Wrath??  For an amount of in-game gold, you’ll be able to reset your starting skills.

• Additional Balance:  We'll tweak what needs a good tweaking as we go.  

 

Much Further Future:  

• At this point most of these are just concepts, nothing is set in stone and much of it will be shaped by YOUR feedback.  

  • Future expansions will increase level cap.  Whether this is 50 levels or 100 levels at a time is TBD.  These will include more zones, dungeons and of course, LOOT!

  • We’ll be looking at alternative skill progression systems.  We want to avoid the scenario where everyone learns everything by level 1000.  What this looks like yet, we don’t know.  But, rest assured, we’ll include systems so your character can respec or adapt.  

  • Completely revised crafting systems.  Again, what this looks like we’re not sure.  We’ve had a lot of inter dialogue and it’s all led us to knowing we need something new and improved.  

 

Closing:  Realm is a different thing for different people.  We believe Mabon’s Gamble is the correct long-term choice for the game we’ve loved for 30 years.  Every decision we’ve made is towards the end of making this the best version of the game we can.  If there’s something you disagree with, let us know!  Like many games, we intend on keeping on top of balance issues, and we need your feedback to be successful in this endeavor.  And if it’s just not your jam, we’ll be keeping the lights on over at Despothe’s Grove as well.  To the players, thanks for your patience!  And to the staff, thanks for all the hard work the last two months!  Long live The Realm Online!