February 2009 Content Patch

[Death-knell]

You'll want to learn the types of resistances the newer mobs have. That was likely your problem.

Well Amon the only character I really played is DK, my ancient dragon. Never power leveled him or used exploits....just worked him all the way there. Now take into consideration I haven't done dragon combat in a while so my memory might be a bit rusty but lets look at this.

Beetles are slightly resistant to slash, well thats a large portion of the dragons attacks, they're highly resistant to pierce....there goes bite as well as a few other special attacks. Beetles are vulnerable to crush....well thats my tail attack but theres no way that does enough damage to win a fight. That leaves prime, but dragon magic ain't the greatest offensive tool. Even with all my scales teched for magic combat I still had to fall back on physical attacks to win fights.

Now, let's look at the fact he's talking about a hatchling. First off youngling, be happy you actually have an armor value for your hide. It was not always as such. But as a hatchling your magic attacks are not useful so you have to rely on your physical attacks. Which as I pointed out above are not real effective against beetles.

So, unless theres been some serious changes to dragon abilities since I've been gone he's right. Hatchlings are going to have issues with beetles.

PS: to OP, you had problems with a mob 2 levels higher then you? Hate to say this but there was a day we had problems with even con mobs.

[Hraefn]

Just tried that beetle thing and... Mmmph. Yeah.

Took a major blow to the dragon pride of once being able to nearly match bipeds in the way they can kill them. Perhaps you could take a look at maybe tweaking that a bit. Hatchlings are going to have a terrible time doing their quests.

[AmonGwareth]

Well Amon the only character I really played is DK, my ancient dragon. Never power leveled him or used exploits....just worked him all the way there. Now take into consideration I haven't done dragon combat in a while so my memory might be a bit rusty but lets look at this.

Beetles are slightly resistant to slash, well thats a large portion of the dragons attacks, they're highly resistant to pierce....there goes bite as well as a few other special attacks. Beetles are vulnerable to crush....well thats my tail attack but theres no way that does enough damage to win a fight. That leaves prime, but dragon magic ain't the greatest offensive tool. Even with all my scales teched for magic combat I still had to fall back on physical attacks to win fights.

Now, let's look at the fact he's talking about a hatchling. First off youngling, be happy you actually have an armor value for your hide. It was not always as such. But as a hatchling your magic attacks are not useful so you have to rely on your physical attacks. Which as I pointed out above are not real effective against beetles.

So, unless theres been some serious changes to dragon abilities since I've been gone he's right. Hatchlings are going to have issues with beetles.

PS: to OP, you had problems with a mob 2 levels higher then you? Hate to say this but there was a day we had problems with even con mobs.

A Dragon has lots of options other than simply slash. You've got breath attacks, spells, you can get gifts from other players that alter your damage types. Time to broaden your play style a bit.

[Dragonboy]

A Dragon has lots of options other than simply slash. You've got breath attacks, spells, you can get gifts from other players that alter your damage types. Time to broaden your play style a bit.

Recieving gifts from other players is good, but from a RP point of view it is wierd. The once rulers of the world begging there former slaves for a buff so they can kill a beetle.
Personally I can understand that something had to change, but like I mentioned before in an earlier post it is weird to have 7 out of 12 attack abilities going down in strenght dramaticly against mobs 10-15 lvls below what you are yourself. 500-600 total damage reduction for goldrage is not really slightly resistant anymore. But the damage is done and I will cope with it. Although I might not agree.

Might it not at least be possible to change the DoT of the Bite ability from Pierce into Bleed or another more logical damage type.
The Pierce damage is made in the initial attack with that I agree, but damage done after that is because of the wound created after the initial attack and thus not Pierce damage.

[Arcat]

Good work, Amon and crew! Thanks for the nice update.

[Death-knell]

A Dragon has lots of options other than simply slash. You've got breath attacks, spells, you can get gifts from other players that alter your damage types. Time to broaden your play style a bit.

Well if you read my post I commented on prime magic, it's not a good stand alone attack, in fact its barely an assist in combat especially at low level and hatchling age group. Breath weapon....lol. Does decent damage but the timer is too long. A dragons main arsenal is his physical attacks. Now if you guys ever made dragon magic what it was suppose to be I wouldn't have said a word. But as is it's sad.

And there are too many beetle quests and times you need to kill the little buggers to go begging for tons of attack mod spells.

I love it, you guys cripple dragons against a common mob and your answer is, "go beg off bipeds" This is just sad.

[Drevar]

One very good option is to find a blighted dragon claw that changes your damage to a type weak to beetles. Ice beetle resistance to fire and fire beetle resistance to ice went down even more this patch. I am hitting for significantly more damage than before when I used the proper type.

As for the rare trophies, I went back through them 1 by 1 and they do technically have a higher price and hoard value than the normal trophy from the mob they drop from. Only ~100 more copper at the trophy hunter though, not exactly a great premium for "rare" drops. Hopefully they will have more use in the future in Trophy quests, etc.

The Greater Fire Elemental Materia have no value though, and cannot be sold. Not sure if it is intended or not, but they are also tinted Bronze (T1) instead of Mithril (T5) or Adamantium (T6).

Drev

[GalemThawn]

... Might it not at least be possible to change the DoT of the Bite ability from Pierce into Bleed or another more logical damage type.

There is no Bleed damage type.

[Sigvard]

Did you mean the beetle was two levels BELOW her, Sigvard? Because you said above.

Two levels above- it was only a small frost beetle. Also tried a level 30 one, but that didn't go down too well either. Said hatchling is still working on the level 20 quests, but does have a full set of t3 scales to make up for it. I'm not really complaining, was just a little shocked at how hard they are now. I guess the beetle's difficulty reflects their decent loot.

I'm absolutely dreading that "kill 50 snow beetles" quest. D:

Going to go back for round 2 after gaining 10 more levels and teching up some spells, Amon. Their slash resistance won't save them now!

[Vlisson]

can anyone show me a screenshot of the new dragon sitting? thanks very much

btw nice patch!

[Takora Drakan]

It is the same as before, the animation was made slower and a bit smoothed out.

[LaughingOtter]

I love it, you guys cripple dragons against a common mob and your answer is, "go beg off bipeds" This is just sad.

This change also impacts biped classes that rely on slash damage - Reavers, for example. It was not targeted at dragons, nor have dragons been 'crippled' with respect to any creature. It may mean a harder fight for a dragon who only uses slash-based attacks, but I think that says more about the degree to which dragons rely on slashing attacks than anything else.

The way I see it, now dragons who have 'kill beetle' quests have an even greater incentive to group up for them. That isn't saying, "go beg off bipeds"; it's saying that we have faith that dragon players will be able to adapt.

[Deth]

I tried a couple beetles last night and I did not find them too bad. But then I am a level 100 Caster dragon and did not fight all that many my self. One thing to remember. They have started setting up mobs so they are harder for some classes or in this case races, then others. It becomes a learn adapt and over come. Take it as a challenge and learn from it. As to it being a quest some will need to be moved to later in the list of when they are done.

[Dragonboy]

This change also impacts biped classes that rely on slash damage - Reavers, for example. It was not targeted at dragons, nor have dragons been 'crippled' with respect to any creature. It may mean a harder fight for a dragon who only uses slash-based attacks, but I think that says more about the degree to which dragons rely on slashing attacks than anything else.

With all due respect to your opinion but it makes no sense what so ever and it makes me doubt if you ever played a dragon.
For 1... No dragon uses only slash damage based abilities, but since Silver strike and Gold Rage have lower timers they are used a lot more often then for example Breath of Lightning. I can use SS twice and GR 4 times in the time I can use BoL only once.
For 2... The devs gave us our abilities so it says more about the devs nerving dragons again then the players who are annoyed by being nerved.

As for the biped comparrison again...
Bipeds can CHOOSE to switch to a school which uses for example Crush damage weapons and so they can farm any beetle again.
Dragons dont have that luxury unless we ask/beg the bipeds for some damage altering spell. And like I mentioned before, but I seem to be ignored. Not all players want to ask/beg biped players for buffs from a RP point of view.
It is a bad thing to FORCE cooperation between players, not everybody always wants to cooperate constantly.

[Takora Drakan]

[*]Fohadon the Mahagra Town Marshall is offering a bounty for the head of Icefang the Wolf.

You have to be a certain level to get that quest? (if it is a quest?) Because I got none (lvl 100 dragon). I had to kill anyway icefang for the attunement quest (is bugged so that you have to kill icefang instead of frostbite). So I got the head and went with it to Fohadon, but he seemed not interested in it?

[Death-knell]

With all due respect to your opinion but it makes no sense what so ever and it makes me doubt if you ever played a dragon.
For 1... No dragon uses only slash damage based abilities, but since Silver strike and Gold Rage have lower timers they are used a lot more often then for example Breath of Lightning. I can use SS twice and GR 4 times in the time I can use BoL only once.
For 2... The devs gave us our abilities so it says more about the devs nerving dragons again then the players who are annoyed by being nerved.

As for the biped comparrison again...
Bipeds can CHOOSE to switch to a school which uses for example Crush damage weapons and so they can farm any beetle again.
Dragons dont have that luxury unless we ask/beg the bipeds for some damage altering spell. And like I mentioned before, but I seem to be ignored. Not all players want to ask/beg biped players for buffs from a RP point of view.
It is a bad thing to FORCE cooperation between players, not everybody always wants to cooperate constantly.

Exactly. Also more to the point what options does a hatchling have. As an ancient I have a nice variety of things to fall back on. A hatchling does not. Hatchling are claw/claw/bite with an occasional thump from their tail. And please don't even start me on dragon magic, it's horrible. A helian is nothing more then a lunas with a little magical backup. Masters of magic...yeah in our dreams.
You want to develop something that would get a lot of people excited. How bout a dragon adventurer who can actually use magic as his attacks and completely forgo physical attacks. Oh to dream!

[velveeta]

don't know if this is an ongoing problem under investigation, but at least one game craft work station is still showing compasses instead of machines....
this is the upper aug granite ws. i haven't personally checked it out, but i understand player built ws are normal........

[AmonGwareth]

Might it not at least be possible to change the DoT of the Bite ability from Pierce into Bleed or another more logical damage type.

Bleed isn't a damage type.

And you do have other types of damage to deal.

You want to develop something that would get a lot of people excited. How bout a dragon adventurer who can actually use magic as his attacks and completely forgo physical attacks. Oh to dream!

There are dragons who can already do this. Maybe you should ask around about how it can be done.

[Vaz]

And the new gingerbread gnome icon is adorable!

Would be so much better if the colour filter were taken off. Same goes for the rare bottlecap icons and the hot cocoa icon.

Also, the first of Kaliphar's new dialogues has several typos:

Kaliphar tells you, 'Welcome back Vhazshyn, your strength and honor know no bounds. The next trial is most difficult, in order to for you to earn your next gift; I need resources of the most rare nature.'
Kaliphar tells you, 'The Dragon's Gift requires two Reagents; The first one being a Brilliant Peridot Gemstone found on the golems of the gems. But not just any Peridot Golem! Seek out Gheniem! He holds the first reagent! Gheniem can be found ear the frozen volcanic islands, north of the frozen peninsula and bring be back the Brilliant Peridot Gemstone.'

The next trial is most difficult, in order to for you to earn your next gift; I need resources of the most rare nature.
=
The next trial is most difficult; in order to for you to earn your next gift, I need resources of the most rare nature.

The Dragon's Gift requires two Reagents; The first one being a Brilliant Peridot Gemstone found on the golems of the gems.
=
The Dragon's Gift requires two reagents, the first one being a Brilliant Peridot Gemstone found on the golems of the gems.
A little addicted to the semicolon, are you? In this instance it's unnecessary and inappropriately used. Does "reagent" really need to be capitalised?

Gheniem can be found ear the frozen volcanic islands, north of the frozen peninsula and bring be back the Brilliant Peridot Gemstone.
=
Gheniem can be found near the frozen volcanic islands, north of the icy peninsula. Bring me back the Brilliant Peridot Gemstone.

Can't comment on the rest of his new dialogues as I haven't gotten that far yet.

Sorry my post is so negative. I love the patch as a whole, and have great appreciation for the work that went into it. I'd just like to see the little details of Istaria as polished as they reasonably can be.

Tip for those who are having trouble with the new beetle resistances: Acquire and use a claw that converts all of your damage to a type they're weak against. For example, I have a claw with a Spirit damage conversion.

It is a bad thing to FORCE cooperation between players, not everybody always wants to cooperate constantly.

Maybe in this game, considering factors such as the preexisting solo-friendliness and the RP paradigm between dragons and bipeds. But in other sandbox games it's a very good thing, resulting in higher-quality community.

[Knossos]

Post Feb 2009 Patch Problem Techniques Adventure: Primal V, Defense: Spirit Resistance V and Spell: Junction V. Patch notes say these need Veteran Zombie Fingers.

I note that the Component “Veteran Zombie Rib” lists the above 3 Techs along with Craft: Tanning V, Craft: Tinkering V, Defense: Nature Ward V and Statistic: Dexterity V. The Veteran Zombie Ribs work fine for the latter 4 .Techs .

Attached is a pic of the Veteran Zombie Rib and Veteran Zombie Finger Components..

It would seem that some changes are needed to the mislisted Components.