The Anvil Of Crom: Age Of Conan Turns 4, Taps SWG For Crafting Inspiration

The final time I did an anniversary retrospective for Age of Conan, we had a current expansion, some new dungeon content material, and several class revamps contemporary on our minds. The 12 months earlier than that, we had the earth-shaking combat and itemization modifications. This previous yr, the most important improvement was, after all, the switch to a freemium business mannequin, followed closely by the sport's first journey pack.

Join me after the break for a quick rundown on the final 12 months as they happened in Hyboria, as well as an anniversary interview with recreation director Craig "Silirrion" Morrison that sheds a little bit of mild on the crafting revamp.

The top of June noticed AoC be a part of the ranks of Western freemium converts with the Unchained update. The majority of the unique Hyborian Adventures campaign was made freely accessible to all comers, together with 4 of the game's 12 classes. The sport's 2.6 patch additionally brought us the Breach and Forgotten Metropolis dungeons in Khitai in addition to appearance armor functionality (and there was much rejoicing).

Per week later, Funcom threw a bone to its hardcore PvP crowd with the introduction of the Blood and Glory special ruleset servers. Deathwish and Rage were initially quite fashionable, and Funcom additionally hinted at some curious instancing tech in the works. We haven't heard a lot about it since, but I anticipate that we'll learn more this summer time after the launch of The key World.

The tip of August brought us AoC's first journey pack. The Savage Coast of Turan was too small to be referred to as a proper expansion however too big for a simple "patch" moniker, and Funcom has hinted that this will likely be the first distribution mannequin going ahead.

We bought a new stage 50 to fifty five playfield with a ton of quests, a stage 50 to eighty scaling solo dungeon, a max-degree solo dungeon, a max-stage group dungeon, and a new raid instance, all of which had been based mostly across the Jason Momoa Conan film that debuted in the summer of 2011.

January saw the introduction of the lengthy-awaited Home of Crom dungeon. Unfortunately (or luckily, relying on how you look at it), this happened after my private AoC sabbatical, so I've but to cover the dungeon here in the pages of The Anvil of Crom. That can be remedied in brief order, although, and in the meantime, you can read all about it on the game's official website.

March introduced us the brand new Jade Citadel raids, additionally fodder for a future column installment or four. The Priest of Mitra class was given an in depth makeover on this update too, and that brings us as much as the present day.

As per AoC anniversary tradition, I had an opportunity to ask a couple of questions of government producer Craig Morrison. Keep reading to see what he has to say in regards to the upcoming crafting revamp plus a complete lot more.

Massively: Is there any overlap between the AoC and TSW dev teams? Any cross-pollination of ideas? For instance, TSW's crafting system appears to be like fairly nifty. Any probability that AoC's upcoming revamp shares something in widespread with it or is impressed by it in any approach?

Craig Morrison: The teams are run independently and have their own resources and administration. Keep in mind that we each run on the identical know-how platform, which is independently developed by one other separate division, so we get many inherent upgrades merely by means of that process. In that means, there are various shared initiatives and concerns. Which means we may use the same Dreamworld characteristic in different ways, simply as we will with the single server technology that is presently in the works. It's a cool situation for a game of our age to be in because it means we can sometimes make the most of some pretty cool technical work that we merely wouldn't be capable of afford otherwise.

When it comes to the crafting system, that's something very distinctive to TSW. They took their inspiration from Minecraft when it got here to their form- and site-primarily based crafting, and it is a cool system, really good fun to play with. Alternatively, I am really trying forward to the new system for Conan. We are looking back a bit extra, taking our inspiration from games like Star Wars Galaxies and the opposite earlier MMOs, with a deal with substances and finding the best combos. That adds a layer of depth that you do not find in the other modern MMOs which have used extra easy list sort crafting techniques, the place you get the same results all of the time.

Personally I feel it's thrilling to see correct crafting making a comeback in our video games. Both approaches have benefit, and I believe what the group is cooking up for Conan is extra fitted to the barely extra stat-based level development now we have in Conan, versus the flatter system in TSW. Nonetheless, each systems are putting a premium on true experimentation and asking players to think and explore the system moderately than simply read an ingredient listing. I really feel it's one thing that MMOs can profit from exploring again.

In regard to a high-stage view of the crafting revamp, how a lot can we anticipate crafters to be essential to the in-sport economic system? Will gamers be capable of get end-recreation gear and consumables from crafters, or will those gadgets stay completely loot-drops?

The intention is for the crafted goods to be aggressive will all but the better of the endgame gear, and possibly even in some situations, present some of one of the best items, although I do not think I wish to forged that as a definite in a single direction or another and make some form of sweeping blanket assertion.

What I will say is that we're aiming for the objects to be useful for veterans and endgame and that the liberty it should characterize will allow those who concentrate on it to make the most effective items. We hope to create a symbiotic relationship there, where a few of the higher items will come from crafters, and crafters will need the assistance of the raiders to collect a number of the rarer components.

Are you able to give us any hints about the following adventure pack? What part of Hyboria will it cowl (geographically, even a common space if you can't get specific)? Can we anticipate it in 2012?

We aren't revealing the precise location of the pack just but, however as we teased within the final growth letter, we're trying south once more, close to one among the unique sport areas.
The adventure pack is currently aimed for the tip of the 12 months, sure. The crew is currently onerous at work on it in order that we will launch it toward the top of Q4.

South, you say? Stygian content material is pretty barren in comparison with the sport's other zones. There's Khemi and Khopshef for levels 20-35 or so, after which Kheshatta from 70-80. Is the adventure pack set there, or are there any plans to add some extra Stygian content between, say, forty and 70?

I think we addressed that level range in other playfields, like Ymir's Go and Tarantia Commons. I do not think we ever set as much as necessarily have an equal variety of places in every of the video games territories, partly for visual and cultural range and partly to cover some completely different concepts and concepts from Howard's Hyboria.

Since we're trying south, yes, the journey pack content material could well stray nearby geographically, but the cultural and mythos that may affect it is one other beast altogether. Count on to listen to more concerning the adventure pack a bit later in the summer time. Whereas the production teams are separate, as we talked about above, since we're an impartial studio, all of our central groups are shared, so the marketing and PR people are a touch busy proper now with the launch of The key World, so we'll hold the adventure pack reveal till after that.

There's a notion on the market that because of the perceived inadequacies of AoC's launch, the game is not price trying out even four years later. Why do you assume that is, and would you agree that MMOs like AoC are completely completely different animals from their launch builds?

MMOs at all times evolve. That is likely one of the few constants within the genre. Personally I all the time try and check out video games a second or third time, and I feel many veterans are the same. We are additionally helped by the fact that because of the Dreamworld engine, the game nonetheless looks competitive with latest releases. In fact the problems that the game had at launch does have an impact on some veterans' opinions, and that is an expected a part of working in that genre.

I don't suppose you may hold it in opposition to anybody, at the end of the day there were very excessive expectations for that launch, and the unique crew fell simply short of a few of those expectations. It's pure that some players will not offer you a second chance. You will never, ever, win everyone again over. Alternatively, it is considerably of a shame as a result of MMO titles do evolve. So long as you at all times deal with bettering the sport and adding content material, then there is a constant circulate of people who come again to check out the sport again.

In reality, those players often end up as some of your most loyal followers after that as a result of somebody who had an issue with the sport and returns to see the problems they had resolved appreciates how far you will have come. After all, that fluctuates for each player; some really like the changes whereas some really feel a game might have moved away from what they favored about it, however overall we usually hear pretty good things from those that had extended absences from the sport. They come back, they usually remember just how much they appreciated the combat system, or they get to embrace the viscerally mature setting that Hyboria affords.

Any plans to regulate the free-to-play offerings within the close to future, or is Funcom fairly pleased with the quantity of access Unchained players at the moment have?

General we are fairly happy, but we could consider some tweaks and changes. As part of the birthday celebrations for example, we're giving free gamers the power to seize permanent access to the premium dungeons from the unique sport, so we're open to continuing to evolve the free player providing so that the sport stays competitive. I believe free gamers in Age of Conan Unchained have one of the most open systems out there.

No necessary quest or progression content material blocks till they reach max degree is a reasonably sweet deal, one that gives more than many different F2P titles. It is an ever more competitive market, though, so we will certainly continue to change things up as and once we see fit with a purpose to attraction to the ever-growing and ever-extra-demanding military of free gamers on the market.

However, one important level is that we actually need to be able to avoid having to go down the whole pay-to-win path. We've got been very careful to avoid that for a purpose, so we wish to maintain the value to gamers of being premium members. That in flip means that you simply cannot give all the things away for free unless you're prepared to completely embrace a pay-to-win approach, and that isn't somewhere I might be comfy taking the sport.

What about an AA respec for subscribers -- any plans to supply that sooner or later?

The alternate advancement system was designed to not want "respecs" as you can after all simply earn extra points since there is no such thing as a steep curve within the progression, and it is a flat value. So at a basic stage, there aren't any plans to permit for gamers to re-use already spent factors.

If we added a respec we'd have to think about the complete set-up, since players would then never need to get beyond X number of feats they have determined are optimum for various conditions, and they would just switch between them.MINECRAFT-SERVER-HOSTINGmentioned, of course you do not need to stand in the way of players feeling they'll progress, so we may look at it from one other angle, be that some type of changes to the AA development, or maybe sooner or later, some form of a number of-specification system as we are doing for feats.

Finally, pretty much as good because the questing and the storyline in Tortage is, a few of us have actually run it two dozen times now on various alts. Any probability veterans would possibly get a "skip Tortage" capability in some unspecified time in the future?

Sure, I'd like to get something like that in at some stage. We now have talked about it a number of times, however it tends to be a type of things that loses out within the precedence conversations. As we transfer in the direction of a fifth year, it will hopefully be one thing we will sneak in at some stage.

Sounds good -- we're looking forward to the next 12 months!

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How do you get your fingers on one of these codes? Simply watch our Facebook and Twitter pages the place we'll give out all codes from now till Friday night. Best of luck!

Jef Reahard is an Age of Conan beta and launch day veteran as nicely because the creator of Massively's bi-weekly Anvil of Crom. Be happy to suggest a column topic, propose a guide, or perform a verbal fatality via jef@massively.com.