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Varen

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Varen last won the day on April 1 2021

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  1. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    Updated the post for those who don't follow our discord, for our latest announcements check the #dev-blog channel on Discord!
  2. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    — 04/04/2021 Hey everyone, It’s been awhile since we’ve had a big post of sustenance beyond Oracle’s beautiful world building. But, today we have some big news thanks to Varen’s tears and hard work. Mostly the tears. That said, we are happy to introduce you all to the new movement system we’ll be using in RPG Combat. Instead of having someone hop across the battlefield to gank your poor mage, or simply ignoring the fact you have three dudes in full plate protecting you; you will now actually move. Below is a small gif to demonstrate what we mean. https://i.gyazo.com/2fba4bb9ae2d138e56240ede030f3fd0.mp4 As you can see there are two main things we are adding here. One, to move you will now be point and click. The PASTAengine(patent pending) will then calculate your path and send you down it. Secondly, if you noticed that giant white block in the doorway, that is the debug view of an ‘obstacle’. What this means is the movement system will take into account obstacles, even things like GOBs and other N/PCs. Here’s another gif displaying this idea. https://i.gyazo.com/16493b8d29ec262f1a62926b6fc91071.mp4 This opens up a great many things, first and foremost, making movement and placement in a fight far more important and tactical. This is much more in-line with something like DnD or most turn-based RPG systems in video games. This will also allow us to actually implement proper AoEs, so no more having to engage as a caster to drop that giant magical AoE, and no more having to spend multiple turns engaging targets to smack them all with your axe in a meaty cleave. And yes, you can form a shieldwall. Each NPC or PC whose turn it is not currently, will be frozen in place and treated as an ‘obstacle’, meaning you have to go around them. Each character will have a certain amount of ‘Movement Points’ they can spend every turn and you will know before you finalize your move how many points that action will cost you. This means if you want to flank that shieldwall to shank that annoying healer, you’ll need enough movement points to get there. Which means your enemy can simply protect their healer by preventing or hampering your movement. Much of what you are seeing is the early stages of testing. Varen still has quite a bit to finish on implementing how players will interact with this. Like how the path will be displayed, and allowing you the chance to go ‘oh no, that's a bad idea’ and change it or finalize it if you are insane. This is a large stride in going down the route we wish for the RPG combat. And as a last little tid-bit we’ll leave ya’ll with the basis for tanking we are going with. Instead of using an aggro system and taunts to keep all the attention on you, a tank’s main role will be control of the battlefield and/or protecting the squishies. One of the abilities we have drafted up for our first rounds of internal testing for a protection warrior-style character is Thunderclap. This is an AoE that does minimal damage to health, but it will ‘damage’ the movement point pool of anyone caught in it. After all, they can’t shank your healer if they can’t move into shanking range.
  3. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    — 04/03/2021 The answer document for the QnA. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XpujO2i9l_zgjqxjwcIKmdYC2vlOdlqN_qq38-Za2qo/edit?usp=sharing
  4. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    Oracle — 13/01/2021 Hello everyone, It is your resident mapper again with another update on the world editing side of things. Currently I am working on a new biome of Opej'Nor, one that I am pretty excited about due to its autumnal theme. This biome is one of many ways of how I want to introduce more variety to the island. In general, my world editing process has always been one of many iterations and today I want to give you a few teasers of the biome's current form. As always, a mandatory disclaimer that everything you are about to see is still a work in progress. As you might remember from my first world editing post, I discussed the concept of landmarks that older players will recognize. The Ruins of Drustgarde, which you can see above is definitely among them. It has had a lot to endure over time and chaos has rained down upon it multiple times, but even today its remnants continue to stand. However, even ruins are not immune to the effects of passage of time, so you can see that nature has already begun the process of reclaiming its land and a part of the ruins have become overgrown. In this next screenshot, you can see another side of the biome and a few hints of what can be expected visible within it. Even when I have a general theme for a biome in mind, I still do my best to introduce even more variety by having various sub-biomes. This makes it so that even if you've seen a part of a particular biome, there's still more to discover within it. I do my best to give every biome this kind of treatment, where each one will have its own unique elements and through that make itself distinct from others. One of the elements of this particular area would be the body of water, something I felt the old Opej'Nor was lacking and ever since I've made it part of my job to introduce more of them. In this last screenshot, you might see a familiar sight from a previous dev blog post. A camp that was cobbled together within the remnants of a large tree, except now I will give you the opportunity to glimpse more of what lies beyond it and mention that these are only a few of the new things that are to come. However, that is all I will share for today, so keep your eyes peeled for more in the future. Any questions? Shoot them my way in #public and I will answer them if I can.
  5. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    — 10/01/2021 Hey peeps, I hope ya'll had a wonderful holiday season. While a certain game release and the holidays slowed down our work a bit, we are still trudging along. @Oracle is working on more beautiful world edits that will be the areas for some completely new dangers and environments, and some potential friends or foes. I am very excited for this part of Opej'nor, we have plans for some really cool content that we believe will provide a good deal of entertainment value and help encourage RP. @Varen 𓀪 has been cr-working very hard on a major potential change to how the RPG handles a key mechanic. While I would love to speak more on this, I'll leave that to our resident P.I.(pasta intelligence) to explain when he is ready, depending on if it breaks the WoW engine or not. For my part, I've been working with the wonderful @Malanius on wikipedia articles. I am hoping to get as much of the lore of the Doldrums prior to the shutdown up as possible and making the wiki pretty. I am almost satisfied with the articles we have done, and once that is accomplished we are going to make things look better. Included in this post is a little screenshot of the wiki as it is now, as well as a video about broccoli. (its actually another size comparison for old Opej'Nor vs. New) https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/740364081378230314/797212181090664478/OpejComparison.mp4
  6. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    — 30/11/2020 Hey, everyone. Been awhile since we dropped an update. It's been a busy month, however, we are still hard at work on Unknown Shores. We do not have anything to share sadly, in terms of the new RPG mechanics yet, but we are approaching our internal playtest. Once we get past that, we'll be able to start telling ya'll what we're doing. @Oracle is still hard at work on the revamp for Opej'Nor, he is working on a new zone for the island, while I work on some new and interesting stories for it to tell and things for you all to do. It isn't fully done yet, but here's a couple of night-time screenshots of a few places we feel are close enough to done. As for our wiki, it is taking much longer then I expected, so I'll drop the Scarlet shutdown lore in the #world-blog after this. We've about six or seven more pages I want to get up and ready before I drop the link here.
  7. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    WORLD EDITING In today’s dev blog, written by our mapper Oracle, we will be delving deeper into the ongoing world edits and how they come to be. During the initial stage of development after the server went down back in July, there was a lot of back and forth about what should happen. When we discussed what kind of changes Opej’Nor should see, what quickly came to light is that the current state of the island lacked incentives for players to fully explore it, as it largely looked the same wherever you went. We want the island to be capable of offering diverse locations and experiences, in short, each location should have its own theme and purpose, which in turn gives players a reason to seek them out. A few meetings later, we had drawn up a rough map with several zones that we wanted the island to have. We went through several Blizzard maps and made a compilation of various environments that we liked and could roughly fit the themes we envisioned. World edits could finally start properly at this point. I began the process by preparing palettes of objects, as picking the correct pieces to build with is just as important as the building itself; this ensures that the chosen assortment of objects look good together and that the identity of the zone remains consistent. The images above are the result of several biome tests I worked on inside Noggit, where I put my palettes to the test. They were done on a new developer island created specifically for this purpose, that way I did not have to worry about interfering with existing islands by experimenting there. Once I was satisfied with the outcomes and felt I had a good grasp on how I wanted each zone of Opej’Nor to look, I could finally get to the meat of the actual work. That is where I had to make some difficult decisions, such as: how truthful do we want to remain to the original shape of the island? After weighing the pros and cons of several options and discussing them within the team, I felt it was better to do a complete reimagining of Opej’Nor, rather than trying to work around its existing limitations. A reason for this decision is a desire to introduce more vertical level design on the island, which was simply not possible with how horizontal (flat) it was before. During this process, I kept my eyes out for any landmarks that looked recognizable and left them in the same relative position on the island, so that players will still have some parts they can recognize from the older version of the island. For example, while exploring you will still be able to find the ruins of Drustgarde. High Hearth and Haven are where you would expect them to be as well, with some minor landmarks that can be recognized within the areas between them. ⠀ Several tools were created to ease the pains of development as well. Through these tools I was able to do most of the terrain sculpting in Blender, which allowed me to sculpt the general shape of the island in a matter of days rather than the weeks it would have taken me in Noggit. After that, the map is imported back into Noggit again, but still remains very barebones as it lacks any terrain textures and objects to decorate it. ⠀ Above, you can see a rough breakdown of the steps I took to put the settlement of Haven together. In essence, I start with the skeleton and move the biggest pieces into place before continuing on with the detail work. Once all the work in Noggit is done, the final step is to choose a skybox for the area, which will determine the in-game lighting, which you can see in the last image of the video above. ⠀ In this video, it can be seen how an area of the Opej’Nor Wilds came together and shows one of the ways through which I introduced verticality to the island. My vision for this area is of a place that feels overgrown, conveying that nature itself is in charge here and civilization has been left behind. You could even go as far as to call this a sub-zone of the Wilds, as I created several areas within the larger zone with their own distinct look. Even now, many areas remain unfinished and on others work has yet to begin. World editing is a constant iterative process, where you try to see if something looks good, and of trying something new if it does not. Sometimes this even results in the creation of a new sub-zone, just like the one above. ⠀ Before I leave you, you can see a few more in progress areas in the last video. These are much rougher in nature and very much unfinished, but I hope that by breaking down two areas I have given you an idea of what can be expected. As a final note, any questions regarding world edits may be directed towards @Oracle (me) in #public. If you are afraid that I might have missed an area that felt important to you as a landmark, feel free to notify me as well and perhaps I will find a way to have it represented on the new map.
  8. Varen

    Dev-Blog: Shores Renovation

    The Upheaval: Date: 06/27 Year: 30 Shortly after the rediscovery of Pandaria on Azeroth, the Doldrums underwent drastic changes and its denizens were given reminders of how dangerous the islands could be. Those living on Opej'Nor first noticed the rising of the tide, which was a strange occurrence in itself as the Doldrums had no natural tide. They could only watch as floods slowly swept across the coastline, threatening to swallow both Egtown and Haven's port and forcing those living there to abandon their homes. Thanks to the efforts of Haven's guard and the Palm Rats, panic was kept to a minimum, though reports of looting still occurred. As things began to settle and fear gave way to curiosity, Opej'Nor was suddenly rocked by a massive quaking of the land. Once more panic had to be contained as the sturdy earthworks of Haven buckled and gave way, burying whatever remained of the now flooded port. As Egtown began to collapse into the sea, a deep rift tore open, swallowing the shanty town before ripping through the heart of New Moonbrook all the way to the foot of the mountains. High Hearth saw cliffs shear away, toppling the iconic zeppelin into the ocean. Believing the end was upon them as they bore witness to the cliff face creeping closer and closer to their encampment, the Scarlet Crusaders mustered what supplies they could and fled for the safety of Haven. In the aftermath, the various powers and people of the island scrambled to aid each other however they could, but it wasn't until the Scarlets arrived at the gates of Haven that the magnitude of what had happened could be realized. What appeared to be a marshy island with fungus as tall as the highest treetops of Ashenvale had collided with Opej'Nor. Some reported that it must have been the mysterious island of Salt Mire, but so few had ever been to the island it was just speculation. What all agreed on was that it had moulded into Opej'nor, twisting the jungle and absorbing it into the mysterious bog. These events were only the beginning of the changes that would sweep across the Doldrums. This is the first blog post revolving around the events that happen to the Doldrums during the shutdown. We'll be periodically releasing these as more events are finalized.
  9. A few more updates on what's been going on behind the scenes! On the mapping front, we're using new tools that allow our resident Mapper to sculpt terrain features directly in Blender, before moving everything in noggit for detailing. This increases the speed and quality of what can be done far beyond what noggit alone could achieve. As of right now, Haven is fully complete, and we're now working on the 'Wilds' biome, which lies between New Moonbrook and the Drustgarde ruins. We've also decided on going forward with the implementation of V4, which will result in a complete overhaul of the current RPG. Gathering, Crafting, and Combat will all be vastly different from what Unknown Shores has had since it originally launched in 2018, so look at this space for more updates on what that entails as we finalize the design documents for it. We're putting our entire mapping focus on a full rework of Opej'nor, and new large scale additions, which all come with a far higher quality than any map we've had. This means reworked and wholly new biomes, topography and creatures, greatly increasing the breadth of experience in exploration and adventuring. With skilled use of the new tools we've built for editing, we'll have a map that rivals the best in the private server scene! We'll soon be working on a post detailing the lore of what led to such huge changes to the Doldrums, so stay tuned for that. Above: Old Opej'nor VS new in noggit, with the different biomes highlighted. And in other news, we've managed to get rid of the launcher, with a bespoke solution for 7.3.5 that allows us to have a tiny client, meaning that any updates needed will be automatically done when the client is launched. This will also generally be faster than what the launcher had before, and allow us to make new patches in an even easier manner, something we're using to good effect during development.
  10. Varen

    Temporary Shutdown

    Unknown Shores will be going offline for a few months, starting from the 1st of July. We will be working on much needed fixes to our management style and the available content on the server. Shores has been up continuously since its launch in 2018, weathering tumultuous episodes that other servers would have closed under. Thus, it has accumulated many issues that need cleaning up both mechanically and story wise. We have chosen to go through this temporary shutdown in order to give us time to do more than apply some band-aids. During this downtime we’ll be working with temporary extra staff on revamps and additions to our islands for people to explore and roleplay in, as well as adding to and changing existing content to come out with the 7.3.5 update. As stated before; we're not just looking to place band-aids over old wounds, we are looking to remedy them and seek to give you, the players, the experience that you deserve. We will also seek to begin the highly suggested advertising campaign, create a brand new website, a new wiki board, and revise the role of the forums we currently have. We aim to keep the community informed with regular updates, showcasing the new systems being coded, teasers for the new areas to explore and the new opportunities that players will have available to them. We recognise that the server has been a daunting experience for new players and we seek to mitigate these issues by the time the server relaunches. We want this to be a community that welcomes both veterans and fresh faces to our story. We’re also looking to hire more people to have a larger staff pool when we reopen, so if you’re interested, do contact us! We look forward to welcoming you all back again soon and look forward to giving you our first progress report in the coming weeks!
  11. Varen

    RPG Patch v3.3.5

    Ability Change: Guard +Can be used during the fight invitation period. - This change allows characters AND NPCs to guard during the fight invitation phase. The 10 energy cost of Guard will be paid on the first-turn starting energy when used this way.
  12. Varen

    RPG Patch v3.3.5

    Proposed AI Changes A rework planned on how the AI chooses its targets in turns, rather than just going for whoever has the lowest HP, the AI manager will look at the stats of the NPC and make an informed decision based on the available targets. NPCs with worse stats will be "dumber" about their decision making process, as they have less information to work with, while stronger NPCs will try to be more optimal. This would allow variation between NPC types and perhaps even changing of their tactics during the fight, if conditions change.
  13. Varen

    RPG Patch v3.3.5

    -Removed "Then engage target" from intervene. This allows the ability to be used on both allies and enemies to clear engagements. -Added Tower Shield Changes: Rare - Tower Shield [0-5, Str 4.0, 0% Crit] Damage Taken -15%, +200 HP, -1 Energy Regen Requires 8 Str - An option for shield users who wish to focus on tanking even more damage above other utility.
  14. Varen

    7z.dll?

    What's your operating system? Which program are you using to extract the files? I know that winrar sometimes causes issues, so I suggest using 7zip. Do ping me on discord too if you can, it makes it easier to back and forth about the issue.
  15. Varen

    Unable to login

    The acc is right, If you can't remember your pass, PM me a new one and I can set it for you.
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