New Content Update Part 3
Posted: Tue Jul 09, 2019 4:00 pm
Hi THF!
This is our third and final instalment of updates to give you an insight to our progress with the new content, coming soon to THF.
Brief recap summary
First up, a recap/update on some of the numbers and stats relating to this new content (this is a nice summary for the TLDR amongst you
)
And we're still not yet done.
Overall Content Design
To recap what this content update is all about, it will be T9 content that sits alongside the existing T9 content (DSK3, VT) and continues the story that starts in T7 (the Foresight of Farseer and Citadel of the Worldslayer, released in December 2018). It will be a large open zone (no access requirements but tough T9 level content) and an instance, which you’ll need to complete an access quest for.
A reminder; in the last teaser update, we told you this new content would require some thought and puzzle solving to unlock everything there is to see. There are several small tasks that will be great fun to take part in and you can do in an hour or so, but the main story-line will take several hours, if not days, to complete.
With this, the final teaser, I want to make something really clear in case you didn't pick up on this previously...
In order to take part in this story, you have to start in the T7 zone Citadel of the Worldslayer!
Citadel of the Worldslayer is a group instance that was released in December 2018, just seven months ago. This content introduced the story of the Farseer sisters and their battle against the Blight. Along with this content, two new quests were introduced but they were not advertised!
Both of these quests are a prerequsuite to the access quest for the new T9 instance that is coming with this content release!
I want to quickly cover the two quests, give you some clues and point you in the right direction. This is because you have time to get them completed before the T9 content is released. This also means you get to enjoy the T7 group instance if you haven't already.
Quest 1: Believe it or not, only one character has completed this quest so far!. This means that only one character on the entire server is 50% through the prerequisites for the access quest to the new T9 zone.
The quest is entirely contained within Citadel of the Worldslayer. Speak to Ghillie to gain access to the instance and bring a group!
For two hints about this quest, please click on the link below...
WARNING *** SPOILER ***
Quest 2: This was a silent content release. It wasn't announced whatsoever with the release in December. We sort of wanted people to find out about it on their own as a nice surprise. However, so far, no one has found it
For two hints about this quest, please click on the link below...
WARNING *** SPOILER ***
Final note on this... If you haven't already, please DO go and read the lore. To recap, you can read it here or you can speak to Azakir the Storyteller, in the forest zone.
Even if you have read it, you'll want to familiarise yourself with the story again soon. The new content, the puzzles and a lot of clues are all linked to the story. And this new content is all about the story!
New Visual Cues for Battles
We mentioned the new NPC interactions and logic in the last update in May.
This update, I want to touch on a new feature that we think really enhances the scripted encounters and battles you take part in: Visual Cues.
In most cases, any event or trigger or special feature of an encounter has usually been transmitted by emotes, messages to players or shouts and so on. This won't change necessarily with the new content as we feel this is an integral part of game play. However, this new content will also include some visualisation that will give you warnings or hints about what is happening, or what is about to happen!
This is mostly delivered through particle effects. Dozens of different effects, actually! These effects bypass the client settings that turn off spell particles (which we understand many like to have totally turned off), so they'll always be visible for everyone, even if you have spell spam turned off. We've taken care to ensure the effects are tastefully done, not overbearing or spammy. But, in testing, we have found they introduce a whole new element to game play where you have to learn, look out for and react to visual cues. In some cases, it's as simple as an egg about to hatch that visibly pulses with an effect... in others, it's a matter of watching out for the flickering shadow of a fiery meteorite that's about to fall from the sky... so you'd better move!
These are subtle but really engaging effects and we think they're a huge success in testing. But we're of course keen to hear any feedback you may have, both now and when you get to actually try them out for yourself!
Conclusion
We’re about 85-90% completed with the new content. All that's left to do is to finish the instance and all of the content it contains. We hope to get the content release out before the end of summer.
This is our third and final instalment of updates to give you an insight to our progress with the new content, coming soon to THF.
Brief recap summary
First up, a recap/update on some of the numbers and stats relating to this new content (this is a nice summary for the TLDR amongst you
)- One of the two new zones has been completed!
- Over 170 new npcs created or edited from existing (non-custom) npcs [129 last update]
- 156 scripts written for npcs and quests (with between 300 and 1000+ lines of code each) [143 last update]
- 15 new quests written, some including events/tasks not yet seen on THF (so not exclusively kill/loot types) [13 last update]
- 100+ items created
- 51 new player spells/item effects
- 5 new recipes
And we're still not yet done.
Overall Content Design
To recap what this content update is all about, it will be T9 content that sits alongside the existing T9 content (DSK3, VT) and continues the story that starts in T7 (the Foresight of Farseer and Citadel of the Worldslayer, released in December 2018). It will be a large open zone (no access requirements but tough T9 level content) and an instance, which you’ll need to complete an access quest for.
A reminder; in the last teaser update, we told you this new content would require some thought and puzzle solving to unlock everything there is to see. There are several small tasks that will be great fun to take part in and you can do in an hour or so, but the main story-line will take several hours, if not days, to complete.
With this, the final teaser, I want to make something really clear in case you didn't pick up on this previously...
In order to take part in this story, you have to start in the T7 zone Citadel of the Worldslayer!
Citadel of the Worldslayer is a group instance that was released in December 2018, just seven months ago. This content introduced the story of the Farseer sisters and their battle against the Blight. Along with this content, two new quests were introduced but they were not advertised!
Both of these quests are a prerequsuite to the access quest for the new T9 instance that is coming with this content release!
I want to quickly cover the two quests, give you some clues and point you in the right direction. This is because you have time to get them completed before the T9 content is released. This also means you get to enjoy the T7 group instance if you haven't already.
Quest 1: Believe it or not, only one character has completed this quest so far!. This means that only one character on the entire server is 50% through the prerequisites for the access quest to the new T9 zone.
The quest is entirely contained within Citadel of the Worldslayer. Speak to Ghillie to gain access to the instance and bring a group!
For two hints about this quest, please click on the link below...
WARNING *** SPOILER ***
Quest 2: This was a silent content release. It wasn't announced whatsoever with the release in December. We sort of wanted people to find out about it on their own as a nice surprise. However, so far, no one has found it
For two hints about this quest, please click on the link below...
WARNING *** SPOILER ***
Final note on this... If you haven't already, please DO go and read the lore. To recap, you can read it here or you can speak to Azakir the Storyteller, in the forest zone.
Even if you have read it, you'll want to familiarise yourself with the story again soon. The new content, the puzzles and a lot of clues are all linked to the story. And this new content is all about the story!
New Visual Cues for Battles
We mentioned the new NPC interactions and logic in the last update in May.
This update, I want to touch on a new feature that we think really enhances the scripted encounters and battles you take part in: Visual Cues.
In most cases, any event or trigger or special feature of an encounter has usually been transmitted by emotes, messages to players or shouts and so on. This won't change necessarily with the new content as we feel this is an integral part of game play. However, this new content will also include some visualisation that will give you warnings or hints about what is happening, or what is about to happen!
This is mostly delivered through particle effects. Dozens of different effects, actually! These effects bypass the client settings that turn off spell particles (which we understand many like to have totally turned off), so they'll always be visible for everyone, even if you have spell spam turned off. We've taken care to ensure the effects are tastefully done, not overbearing or spammy. But, in testing, we have found they introduce a whole new element to game play where you have to learn, look out for and react to visual cues. In some cases, it's as simple as an egg about to hatch that visibly pulses with an effect... in others, it's a matter of watching out for the flickering shadow of a fiery meteorite that's about to fall from the sky... so you'd better move!
These are subtle but really engaging effects and we think they're a huge success in testing. But we're of course keen to hear any feedback you may have, both now and when you get to actually try them out for yourself!
Conclusion
We’re about 85-90% completed with the new content. All that's left to do is to finish the instance and all of the content it contains. We hope to get the content release out before the end of summer.