<div class="date">Sep 25th 2006, 15:30 GMT</div><div class="headline">Weekly development activities (September 25, 2006)</div>Weekly Development Activities (September 25, 2006)<br>
<br>
<b>In QA</b><br>
These items are in QA and should be a part of Module 3.<br>
<br>
<b>Performance</b><br>
<ul><br><li>The landscape renderer has been overhauled to provide better
performance (especially load times). In addition, the new landscape
engine enables huge draw distances that were not possible before. <br>
</li><li>The overall frame rate has been improved and 'hitching' reduced. <br>
</li><li>Avatars and monsters are now a bit brighter than other objects
(the intensity depends upon the environment and lighting conditions). <br>
</li><li>Overall bandwidth of the game will be reduced another 1-3%,
and certain problematic dungeons and laggy areas will be significantly
improved by 20-50% (when your client gets flooded with information
about objects in your local area). <br>
</li></ul><br>
<br>
<b>UI Improvements</b><br>
<ul><br><li>The text on the XP bar has been clarified to make it more obvious
that you have not lost the XP you were accruing toward your bonus AP
when you die and get an XP debt while you are working toward bonus
action points. <br>
</li><li>You will now get chat feedback in the combat window when you hit someone with a non-damaging spell (like fear or slow). <br>
</li><li>The "New Mail" icon will now appear on the Focus Orb even if it is minimized. <br>
</li><li>The "To" and "Subject" line of the Compose Mail UI no longer accept carriage returns. <br>
</li></ul><br>
<br>
<b>General</b><br>
<ul><br><li>Phantasmal killer is now a fear effect. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">OH NO JOE!!</span><br>
</li><li>The Silver Flame has recognized that the brothers stationed in
Taverns have been casting an inferior version of Restoration. From now
on, the spell cast in taverns will remove 1 negative level in addition
to all the other Restoration effects. <br>
</li><li>Players will no longer get stuck while dismounting from ladders. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">OH NO BASTARDS!!</span>
</li><li>We are pleased to announce the addition of the /showhelmet command which can be used to hide your helmet graphic. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">OH FINALLY MY DREADLOCKS CAN SWING FREE AGAIN!!
</span>
</li><li>We are improving the combat/damage feedback mechanism. This
will not only eliminate "false" hits where the target would flinch but
no attack roll would take place, but also give better feedback as to
the strength of the hit. <br>
</li><li>When you successfully swap a spell, you will now get an alert telling you that it worked. <br>
</li><li>Poison dart and poison grenade traps will now actually poison you instead of doing poison hp damage. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">DANG</span></span>
</li><li>Lava Cam! When your camera is in lava, it now looks more like it's in lava, as opposed to water. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">LIKE IT MATTERS - YOU DIE
</span></span>
</li><li>Made some small tweaks to our avatar animations. For example,
human female's wrists won't twist in the dual weapon combo attack,
dwarven arms won't over-extend when they use an axe to cleave, etc. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">DOES THIS MEAN ODILE'S ASS WON'T EXTEND??</span>
</li></ul><br>
<br>
<b>Monsters</b><br>
<ul><br><li>Spiders<br>
<ul><br><li>Some mid- and high-level (mostly CR 7 and up) spiders have new stronger poisons. <br>
</li><li>Most spiders on the hard and elite settings have had their
attack damage reduced significantly, particularly those on the elite
setting. <br>
</li><li>Widow type spiders will once again shoot functional webs. <br>
</li></ul><br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- The mind flayer and vampire's dominate abilities no longer dispel protection from evil. <br>
</li><li>Some ogres have been eating their veggies and will be able to see and hear better than they could before. <br>
</li><li>Several bow wielding enemies will now shoot various energy
arrows like flaming arrows or cold arrows. These will do the typical
piercing damage (1d6 and up) in addition to various amounts of energy
damage. <br>
</li><li>Several resourceful enemies have begun using various
alchemical substances in battle. In most cases, these will affect
players as energy damage over time. <br>
</li><li>Elemental Empathy will work properly on Earth Elementals that have used their Earthgrab ability. <br>
</li><li>More powerful versions of Mummy Rot are now labeled
accordingly: Pernicious Mummy Rot is more dangerous than regular Mummy
Rot, and Virulent Mummy Rot is even more lethal. <br>
</li><li>Female humanoid villains will no longer charge into melee range if armed with spells or bows. <br>
</li><li>We are fixing an issue with the death animations of Arcane
Skeletons. They will no longer "eat collectables" they should be
creating. <br>
</li></ul><br>
<br>
<b>Combat</b><br>
<ul><br><li>All enemy trips and knockdowns now have dual saves (an initial save
and a secondary save). Most give you an ability modifier check for the
initial save to determine whether or not you fall. This is usually your
Strength or Dexterity modifier, whichever is greater on your character.
Some knockdowns like grease give a reflex save as the initial save.
Once you fall down, your secondary save checks will occur every two
seconds and are versus your balance skill to determine when you stand
back up. <br>
</li></ul><br>
<br>
<b>Spells</b><br>
<br>
Spell Changes<br>
<ul><br><li>Resist Energy is now available for clerics, paladins, rangers, and
wizards. Protection from Energy is now available to Rangers, Wizards,
and Clerics. This change allows these classes to cast Protection From
Energy and Resist Energy the same way a sorcerer can, by memorizing a
single spell and then choosing which damage type to ward against. The
days of memorizing several Resist Energy: (Element) are no more! <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">LOVE YOU GUYS, NO MORE POTS FOR ME.</span></span>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Protection from Evil has
been fixed to work correctly. It no longer protects against *all*
charms and compulsions (including Otto's, command, hold monster/person,
etc). Rather, it only protects against charms and compulsions that give
ongoing mental control, such as the vampire's dominate ability. Also,
as per D&D rules, it no longer protects against mental control from
evil creatures, but ALL mental control, regardless of the target's
alignment. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Holy smite will now work damage spiders.<br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- The Teleport spell no
longer has a Somatic casting component so players will not suffer an
arcane spell failure chance for Teleport while wearing armor. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Niac's cold ray now uses the proper ray cast animation. <br>
</li></ul><br>
Metamagic Fixes <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">LOOKS GOOD??</span></span>
<ul><br><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Resistance, Restoration, Raise Dead and See Invisibility spells can now be used with the Eschew Materials feat. </li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>-
Find Traps, Ice Storm, Magic Missile, Scorching Ray and Searing Light
no longer consume additional spellpoints while the Heighten Spell feat
is active. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Holy Smite and Niac's Cold Ray can now be used with the Heighten Spell feat. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Dismissal no longer consumes extra spell points while the Maximize or Empower spell feats are active. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Feeblemind and Waves of Fatigue no longer consume extra spell points while the Extend Spell feat is active. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Ray of Exhaustion can now be used with the Heighten spell feat. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Sleet Storm no longer consumes addition spell points while the Heighten spell feat is active. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Wall of Fire <br>
<ul><br><li>No longer consumes additional spellpoints while the Heighten spell feat is active. <br>
</li><li>Wall of Fire can now be used with the Extend Spell feat.<br>
</li></ul><br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Shocking grasp can now be affected by the Heighten Spell metamagic feat. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Solid Fog and Grease no longer consume additional spellpoints when under the effects of the Heighten Spell metamagic feat. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Melf's Acid Arrow no longer consumes additional spellpoints while the heighten spell feat is active. <br>
</li></ul><br>
Spell Description Updates<br>
(these are just text changes, not changes to spell functionality)<br>
<ul><br><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Spell descriptions now use color for greater readability!<br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Player spells will now
state in their descriptions if the spell has a saving throw to resist,
and if so, the results of a successful save. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Ray of Enfeeblement
description fixed, it had been indicating an extraneous +1 STR damage
that it did not do, and was missing max caster level information. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Hold spells have been updated to state that they have a save interval. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- Player spells that have a max Hit Dice cap should now state this in their description. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>– Melf's Acid Arrow description has been updated to list the correct interval. <br>
</li><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>– Wall of Fire description now been updated to include damage amounts. <br>
</li></ul><br>
<br>
<b>Skills & Abilities</b><br>
<ul><br><li><font color="red"><b>NEW</b></font>- The magnitude of the bonus
provided by Action Boost: Attack and Action Boost: Skills have been
reduced at the higher level enhancements. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">FFS-HAVEN'T EVEN GOTTEN THERE YET.</span></span>
</li><li>Bards can now activate their singing abilities while moving!
The activation time on their singing abilities has been reduced
significantly as well. An animation glitch has also been fixed! <br>
</li><li>The description for the Paladin's Lay on Hands ability has
been corrected to better describe the amount of healing/damage that the
ability does. <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">"YOUR ASS HAS BEEN PALADINISED"</span></span>
</li></ul><br>
<br>
<br>
<b>Under Development</b><br>
These items are currently in development and are scheduled for some time Module 3. <br><br><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">I should really be studying. looking forward to tomorrow, Leigh
</span></span><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Leigh Murphy,<br>Højmarken 13, Gevninge, <br>4000 Roskilde, <br>Danmark. <br>(H) + 45 46 36 02 20 (M) + 45 50 59 80 25<br><br>photos <a href="http://www.dspsrv.com/leigh">www.dspsrv.com/leigh
</a><br>Skype: LeighSter