Dev Chat, 9/11/04
<^J^> Good
evening and welcome to another Stratics house of commons chat. Tonight
our guests are the developers of Lineage 2! The topic will be general
discussion so all questions about the game are welcome.
<^J^> Again, please send said questions to [QT]Gowel and not to myself or the developers. Full logs of the chat will be up on chat.stratics.com shortly after the chat.
<^J^> So, without further ado, we'll start with a brief introduction from the developers. Now would be a good time to send in those
<[NC]Tisirin> I'm Tisirin.. I'm the NCsoft Community relations manager. Howdy!
<[NC]Ash> I'm Ash. I'm the Lineage II Community Coordinator.
<Turnikus> I'm Turnikus, I'm the producer of Lineage 2 here in the States.
<[NC]Ornery> I'm Ornery, the QA Lead for Lineage II.
<[NC]Mistryl> Mistryl here, the QA Community Coordinator for Lineage II.
<Draven> I'm Draven, Head GM for Lineage 2.
<Turnikus> *[7DS-Bartz]TemptressMaaya* what will be done about the growing problem of foreign users?
<Turnikus> I don't see the foreign players as a problem. This is a generalization that is based one a very small cross-section of players outside the US...
<Turnikus> Most of our external players just wanted to play a game that hadn't become available in their territory, yet.
<^J^> *Ernesto* Question 1: The eternal question - Why are there still literally hundreds of professional virtual property gathereres working for companies like IGE still running around in the game, the community has known many of them for several months, but yet they are still here, ruining our gameplay experience
<Turnikus> Look, farmers exist because people have a demand for goods. Without demand, it would not be profitable enough to maintain their illicit activities. All we can counter the use of 3rd party program usage on the backend.
<Turnikus> We have joined up with Vero on Ebay to prevent sales and will continually strive to make sure that these types of players do not interrupt regular, law-abiding players.
<^J^> *qwerty* What will you do to prevent people from hacking and using a 3rd person program that lets the user have an unfair advantage?
<Turnikus> We have been improving security constantly to stop these programs, along with detection of usage. This allows use to detect these programs before other players are even bothered by them. I consider these programs cheating, pure and simple.
<^J^> *[7DS-Bartz]TemptressMaaya* Do we have an exact date for Chronicle 2 yet?
<[NC]Ash> Chronicle 2 is slated for release the second week of December.
<^J^> *[THoR]KryptiK* will the asians soon be banned from us servers and told to play on the new chinese servers?
<[NC]Tisirin> No.
<^J^> *[7DS-Bartz]TemptressMaaya* Will there be more GM-hosted events in the future?
<Turnikus> We are going to continue events so long as the player's enjoy them. We have several more events already scheduled before Jan. We also enjoy creating and manning these and plan to create a dedicated team specifically for these events.
<^J^> *choch* You have said that you will not be copying characters or increasing exp/drop rates on the test server. How do you realistically expect the players to test the high end content for Chronicle 2's release to avoid bugs making it to the live server without giving test characters a bump?
<[NC]Mistryl> Since we are not wiping the test server for the Chronicle 2 test, there is already a wide range of player levels on the server. Chronicle 2 is not all high-end content; for example, some of the new quests start at level 15.
<[NC]Mistryl> We also plan on having events on the test server where we will meet with players and possibly bump up their levels. We'll announce any events on the official forums once Chronicle 2 is on the server.
<^J^> *spain`vortz* question: does C-grade equipment going to be available in NPC shops when c2 arrives ? if true, wont this blow up all servers economy ?
<[NC]Ash> We will not changing the availability of different grades of weapons or armor from their current availability in Chronicle 1.
<^J^> *ChrisIsBored* I'd like some response towards the suggestion of changing the siege times. I believe they're set far too late for Euro's. As an American I even find the times to be a bit late, I would rather (since it is on the weekend) have siege times during the afternoon, rather than the evening.
<[NC]Tisirin> Within approximately a month, We are planning on opening a server that will have a European siege timetable. The server will be called Eva.
<^J^> *wads* is putting yourself into shop mode repeatly instead of sitting down to regeneration MP a punishable offense?
<Draven> Nope, that is not considered a punishable offense.
<^J^> *spain`vortz* are there any forthcoming rideables aside from stryder/wyvern in future chronicles?
<^J^> *Bitmob* Are you looking into developing ways to lessen the level grind? High end PVP looks to be fun; however achieving that goal is much too far off for anyone I know to accomplish in an acceptable amount of time.
<Turnikus> The grind is the number one concern I hear about. We're designing C3 to include more features to alleviate the level grind. Some of these are being addressed in C2 with the monster race, lottery, etc. It gives players more options early one than just hunting.
<^J^> *Alderis* With L2 coming out in europe is there any plans to allow the european players on the NA servers to transfer their current characters to the EU server? I for one do not wish to redo 53 levels, but want the better ping the EU server would provide.
<[NC]Tisirin> Since the Eva (European) server will be part of the North American server set, when character transfers are available, this situation will allow for transfers between current servers and Eva, which will have a European siege schedule, etc.
<^J^> *wads* dont know if people will answer questions about c2, but will the new totems orc tyrants get last the same amount of time as the current ones?
<[NC]Ornery> The new orc tyrant totems in C2 will be of the same duration as the other previous totems.
<[NC]Tisirin> It's really too soon to have a definitive answer on this question. Enjoy striders and we'll see what comes down the pike.
<^J^> *Bitmob* Are you looking into developing ways to lessen the level grind? High end PVP looks to be fun; however achieving that goal is much too far off for anyone I know to accomplish in an acceptable amount of time.
<Turnikus> The grind is the number one concern I hear about. We're designing C3 to include more features to alleviate the level grind. Some of these are being addressed in C2 with the monster race, lottery, etc. It gives players more options early one than just hunting.
<^J^> *Alderis* With L2 coming out in europe is there any plans to allow the european players on the NA servers to transfer their current characters to the EU server? I for one do not wish to redo 53 levels, but want the better ping the EU server would provide.
<[NC]Tisirin> Since the Eva (European) server will be part of the North American server set, when character transfers are available, this situation will allow for transfers between current servers and Eva, which will have a European siege schedule, etc.
<^J^> *wads* dont know if people will answer questions about c2, but will the new totems orc tyrants get last the same amount of time as the current ones?
<[NC]Ornery> The new orc tyrant totems in C2 will be of the same duration as the other previous totems.
<^J^> *PortendingEnnui_Hindemith* will the Wishing Potion quest be fixed prior to C2 release?
<[NC]Ornery> The wishing potion quest will most likely not be fixed prior to the release of C2.
<^J^> *wads* will the pvp system be changed in c2, specifically talking about the fact that as a red, there is no way to defend yourself without becoming more red
<[NC]Ash> Balance in very important to the PvP/karma system. There will be some refinements to it in Chronicle 2, including a cap on how much karma you can acquire per kill. There will also be a quest that will reduce your total PK count, which in turn will reduce the amount of karma per PK.
<^J^> *Autedeae* If noticed the korean lineage2 website is much more informative, compared to its NA counterpart. Is the NA team striving to make a more informative Website. or will it continue to favor 3rd party website for its costumers to find the information they need?
<[NC]Tisirin> We strive to maintain a highly informative site for Lineage II's North American players, and I think we do pretty well. We will always work to improve navigation, accessibility and depth of information on the site, as well as trying to keep it fresh. However, we will also continue to encourage legitimate fan and news sites and do whatever we can to help them grow and foster our unique community.
<^J^> *Twenty* I may be jumping the gun abit here, but could you give us some idea as to what features we will be seeing in future chronicles?
<Turnikus> New lands, skills, and mobs will be added every chronicle. I'm afraid I can't comment on C3 until 05, but it's early design is for enhancing the newbie experience and beginning the multi-Chronicle story arc.
<^J^> Well, that's all the questions we have for this evening.
<^J^> I'd like to thank all the developers for coming out and taking the time to answer questions!
<^J^> Again, please send said questions to [QT]Gowel and not to myself or the developers. Full logs of the chat will be up on chat.stratics.com shortly after the chat.
<^J^> So, without further ado, we'll start with a brief introduction from the developers. Now would be a good time to send in those
<[NC]Tisirin> I'm Tisirin.. I'm the NCsoft Community relations manager. Howdy!
<[NC]Ash> I'm Ash. I'm the Lineage II Community Coordinator.
<Turnikus> I'm Turnikus, I'm the producer of Lineage 2 here in the States.
<[NC]Ornery> I'm Ornery, the QA Lead for Lineage II.
<[NC]Mistryl> Mistryl here, the QA Community Coordinator for Lineage II.
<Draven> I'm Draven, Head GM for Lineage 2.
<Turnikus> *[7DS-Bartz]TemptressMaaya* what will be done about the growing problem of foreign users?
<Turnikus> I don't see the foreign players as a problem. This is a generalization that is based one a very small cross-section of players outside the US...
<Turnikus> Most of our external players just wanted to play a game that hadn't become available in their territory, yet.
<^J^> *Ernesto* Question 1: The eternal question - Why are there still literally hundreds of professional virtual property gathereres working for companies like IGE still running around in the game, the community has known many of them for several months, but yet they are still here, ruining our gameplay experience
<Turnikus> Look, farmers exist because people have a demand for goods. Without demand, it would not be profitable enough to maintain their illicit activities. All we can counter the use of 3rd party program usage on the backend.
<Turnikus> We have joined up with Vero on Ebay to prevent sales and will continually strive to make sure that these types of players do not interrupt regular, law-abiding players.
<^J^> *qwerty* What will you do to prevent people from hacking and using a 3rd person program that lets the user have an unfair advantage?
<Turnikus> We have been improving security constantly to stop these programs, along with detection of usage. This allows use to detect these programs before other players are even bothered by them. I consider these programs cheating, pure and simple.
<^J^> *[7DS-Bartz]TemptressMaaya* Do we have an exact date for Chronicle 2 yet?
<[NC]Ash> Chronicle 2 is slated for release the second week of December.
<^J^> *[THoR]KryptiK* will the asians soon be banned from us servers and told to play on the new chinese servers?
<[NC]Tisirin> No.
<^J^> *[7DS-Bartz]TemptressMaaya* Will there be more GM-hosted events in the future?
<Turnikus> We are going to continue events so long as the player's enjoy them. We have several more events already scheduled before Jan. We also enjoy creating and manning these and plan to create a dedicated team specifically for these events.
<^J^> *choch* You have said that you will not be copying characters or increasing exp/drop rates on the test server. How do you realistically expect the players to test the high end content for Chronicle 2's release to avoid bugs making it to the live server without giving test characters a bump?
<[NC]Mistryl> Since we are not wiping the test server for the Chronicle 2 test, there is already a wide range of player levels on the server. Chronicle 2 is not all high-end content; for example, some of the new quests start at level 15.
<[NC]Mistryl> We also plan on having events on the test server where we will meet with players and possibly bump up their levels. We'll announce any events on the official forums once Chronicle 2 is on the server.
<^J^> *spain`vortz* question: does C-grade equipment going to be available in NPC shops when c2 arrives ? if true, wont this blow up all servers economy ?
<[NC]Ash> We will not changing the availability of different grades of weapons or armor from their current availability in Chronicle 1.
<^J^> *ChrisIsBored* I'd like some response towards the suggestion of changing the siege times. I believe they're set far too late for Euro's. As an American I even find the times to be a bit late, I would rather (since it is on the weekend) have siege times during the afternoon, rather than the evening.
<[NC]Tisirin> Within approximately a month, We are planning on opening a server that will have a European siege timetable. The server will be called Eva.
<^J^> *wads* is putting yourself into shop mode repeatly instead of sitting down to regeneration MP a punishable offense?
<Draven> Nope, that is not considered a punishable offense.
<^J^> *spain`vortz* are there any forthcoming rideables aside from stryder/wyvern in future chronicles?
<^J^> *Bitmob* Are you looking into developing ways to lessen the level grind? High end PVP looks to be fun; however achieving that goal is much too far off for anyone I know to accomplish in an acceptable amount of time.
<Turnikus> The grind is the number one concern I hear about. We're designing C3 to include more features to alleviate the level grind. Some of these are being addressed in C2 with the monster race, lottery, etc. It gives players more options early one than just hunting.
<^J^> *Alderis* With L2 coming out in europe is there any plans to allow the european players on the NA servers to transfer their current characters to the EU server? I for one do not wish to redo 53 levels, but want the better ping the EU server would provide.
<[NC]Tisirin> Since the Eva (European) server will be part of the North American server set, when character transfers are available, this situation will allow for transfers between current servers and Eva, which will have a European siege schedule, etc.
<^J^> *wads* dont know if people will answer questions about c2, but will the new totems orc tyrants get last the same amount of time as the current ones?
<[NC]Ornery> The new orc tyrant totems in C2 will be of the same duration as the other previous totems.
<[NC]Tisirin> It's really too soon to have a definitive answer on this question. Enjoy striders and we'll see what comes down the pike.
<^J^> *Bitmob* Are you looking into developing ways to lessen the level grind? High end PVP looks to be fun; however achieving that goal is much too far off for anyone I know to accomplish in an acceptable amount of time.
<Turnikus> The grind is the number one concern I hear about. We're designing C3 to include more features to alleviate the level grind. Some of these are being addressed in C2 with the monster race, lottery, etc. It gives players more options early one than just hunting.
<^J^> *Alderis* With L2 coming out in europe is there any plans to allow the european players on the NA servers to transfer their current characters to the EU server? I for one do not wish to redo 53 levels, but want the better ping the EU server would provide.
<[NC]Tisirin> Since the Eva (European) server will be part of the North American server set, when character transfers are available, this situation will allow for transfers between current servers and Eva, which will have a European siege schedule, etc.
<^J^> *wads* dont know if people will answer questions about c2, but will the new totems orc tyrants get last the same amount of time as the current ones?
<[NC]Ornery> The new orc tyrant totems in C2 will be of the same duration as the other previous totems.
<^J^> *PortendingEnnui_Hindemith* will the Wishing Potion quest be fixed prior to C2 release?
<[NC]Ornery> The wishing potion quest will most likely not be fixed prior to the release of C2.
<^J^> *wads* will the pvp system be changed in c2, specifically talking about the fact that as a red, there is no way to defend yourself without becoming more red
<[NC]Ash> Balance in very important to the PvP/karma system. There will be some refinements to it in Chronicle 2, including a cap on how much karma you can acquire per kill. There will also be a quest that will reduce your total PK count, which in turn will reduce the amount of karma per PK.
<^J^> *Autedeae* If noticed the korean lineage2 website is much more informative, compared to its NA counterpart. Is the NA team striving to make a more informative Website. or will it continue to favor 3rd party website for its costumers to find the information they need?
<[NC]Tisirin> We strive to maintain a highly informative site for Lineage II's North American players, and I think we do pretty well. We will always work to improve navigation, accessibility and depth of information on the site, as well as trying to keep it fresh. However, we will also continue to encourage legitimate fan and news sites and do whatever we can to help them grow and foster our unique community.
<^J^> *Twenty* I may be jumping the gun abit here, but could you give us some idea as to what features we will be seeing in future chronicles?
<Turnikus> New lands, skills, and mobs will be added every chronicle. I'm afraid I can't comment on C3 until 05, but it's early design is for enhancing the newbie experience and beginning the multi-Chronicle story arc.
<^J^> Well, that's all the questions we have for this evening.
<^J^> I'd like to thank all the developers for coming out and taking the time to answer questions!
