[Tarib]

The last couple of months have been an interesting creative process as we’ve been investigating, discussing, outlining and finally implementing plans for the three projects across the live team.

You can read the full "Game Director Letter - April 2013" on the Age of Conan website

[paulson]

How soon can those Unchained dungeons be released? Before anniversary? And are you going to fix the existing Dragonspine dungeon and make the loot more intresting?

[Misiuggah]

Originally Posted by paulson How soon can those Unchained dungeons be released? Before anniversary?

Unchained dungeons will be released to TL during may, then probably sit at least for a month there (if not longer).

[Scythie]

"much-loved Shrines of Bori PvP game"

Damn you Joel, i had to go get a rag and wipe the screen after bursting out laughing at that.

Anyway, big update and great news about merges with US. Really looking forward to that.Over all it seems to me to be a reasonable and realistic roadmap.

Sepulcher needs some love asap though. A great dungeon that we can't do because it is broken.

[Misiuggah]

Originally Posted by Scythie "much-loved Shrines of Bori PvP game"

I liked Craig, but if he would write that, he would be dead serious

[Rydon]

Also interested to hear if there are any plans to fix Sepulcher of the Wyrm?

[Rathothis]

First of all, many thanks for these news. I like a lot of what you guys have planned, and do hope that these changes will make you some money (after all, that's the best guarantee for future investment ).

Secondly, a few minor questions to clarify the content of the letter:

* will the final encounter in Sepulcher of the Wyrm be reworked? if yes, is the ETA for this the same as for the new Dragonspine content, or any different?

* I think the interview also mentioned that an Unchained mode is in the works for Black Castle, but it is not mentioned in the letter. Is this something you can confirm?

[tapwater]

Server Merges:
When the servers get merged into single giant servers, I do hope Funcom will have a handle on the potential issues. Whenever a server has had a larger influx of players, it slows down, and players across the board have much higher latency problems. I do have a small worry that when you combine Set and Crom, there will be so many players that the servers will run much worse and cause problems for everyone. If that can be dealt with so we have no issues like have cropped up in the past, then we should be good.

Dragon's Spine:
Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought one of the two remaining dungeons was supposed to be solo content. Has that changed or is my memory just faulty?

5th Anniversary:
Can't wait, sounds like a little bit more than previously, which is always appreciated.

[Kurt2013]

One Server Tech:
Back in 2011 one player made a joke of what they now actually do...should have known better back than this would happen...
Why not invest into a code that allows for players choosing the ruleset (pve/pvp/rp) when about to enter an open world instance ("consensual" pvp problem solved, you could merge all into one big server type)?

Dragonspine content:
Good luck there! Hope it does not turn out T3.75 though...

Unchained PvE dungeons:
Will they be simply scaled like Amphi or will they include new updated quests and content? Are you intending to change the old low level instances as well as you did with Amphi?

Unchained PvP:
If you manage to set gear on mini startup (or better: strip players and let them CHOOSE several sets from pre-mini vendors) that would be a nice move...allowing even for more variants in minigame types. So, this looks promising as long as it will keep being an option as addon to existing minis and not be mandatory. Not necessarily counting me in, but there are pvpers who like to test different builds and gear sets against other builds and gear sets...having all maxxed will probably turn boring fast unless there are e-sport like elements. Another approach might be to disable AAs completely in this type of mini or reset them temporarily and giving every player a set amount of points to distribute as they like (instead of maxxing all). PvP does not mean fps (chess is pvp too).
Changes to guards sounds good...fingers crossed you do it right.
But all the best mini games and guards will not work, unless you introduce some open world pvp consequence system that is self-regulating and not forcing people into frames (but still giving consequences).
There will be NO skill based pvp unless you get the synchronizing, exploit policy and network handling right...or slow combat down (which is atm probably very unpopular). But fingers crossed there...maybe things get fixed miracolously (seen it happen!) by physically moving servers and working on the code.

Tradeskill system:
Not sure, if i would have handled things as you did there (with the Gaia importing things and such)...so i will just post a few questions:
- How will existing recipes, done quests and resources be converted into the new system?
- Will charbound skills or such exist or will it be bound all on character amount and player knowledge?
- Will players be able to change existing items?
- Will there be some risk or tradeoff involved (e.g. cursed or broken items, some penalties you can work in to have a better chance of intended benefits)?
- Will you update the resource and bank space according to the new amount of resources (especially for f2p the situation atm is plainly annoying)?
- What about guild city decorations and guild city building?
- Will players be able to do and craft the same things they can now and just get a change of system with more depth and options...or will it be a complete relauch?
- Will there be craftable pvp items or the option to add pvp stats to pve items?
In any case, i think it is rather good news here, that you don't seem bound on rushing such a possibly gamebreaking and important change!

Age of Conan 5th anniversary:
If you want people happy...give them bigger bags, more bank space etc. ...f2p AND premium ... something to store all the wonderfull celebration thingies and things people want to buy with funcom points from the shop in (shop: why are there no options to buy things accountwide or let bought things be put back on claim?).

Code and quality of life:
Good luck with that!
I hope it works out really, but allow me to be a bit sceptical, since for me gametechnicallywise everything gone worse since the "kihtai and engine revamp" preparation patch (which was done to get engine update to aoc because of tsw)...and the new guis (as nice and functional they are) do not really seem to work fine with older code (freezes on inventory, f10, skills, item shop, etc.). So this is quite a bunch of workload i guess.
But in general these things really NEED to be looked at and are for every player important (independant of what you prefer in game pve, pvp etc.). So fingers crossed for that!

[Redd]

Originally Posted by tapwater Server Merges: Dragon's Spine: Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought one of the two remaining dungeons was supposed to be solo content. Has that changed or is my memory just faulty?

Oh god no!! no more solo dungeons pls....