As reported by the DragonRealms NEWS command
Armor Hinderance Changes| Guild | Leather | Chain | Plate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paladins: | 20% | 0% | 0% |
| Barbarians: | 0% | 20% | 33% |
| Rangers: | 5% | 20% | 50% |
| Thieves: | 5% | 50% | 50% |
| All others: | 20% | 20% | 50% |
The skill used in reducing evasion penalties is based on your main armor (the one you wear like a shirt). For example: if you wear leather armor, a plate helm, and chain greaves, each of the armor types will be figured separately for minimum penalties. So, if you are a barbarian who is wearing leather armor, a great helm and a chain aventail, you will be able to reduce the leather armor down to 0%, but the great helm can only be reduced to 33% and the chain to 20%.
Shields are counted in evasion penalties. All professions are able to reduce shields to 33% of their evasion penalties (based on their armor skill).
APPRAISAL has been updated, including the low end messaging.
STANCE settings will have a larger and noticeable effect on how it alters combat...especially for parry and shield settings. Settings of 100 for parry and shield will be more effective. Alternately, low settings will have a larger negative impact.
The effect of this will be that a parry setting of 100 and an evasion/shield setting of 0 will almost entirely cut out the possibility you will evade or have the attack be blocked by your shield. Similar settings for other stances (especially shield) will yield similar effects.
EXPERIENCE and STANCE: Stance settings lower than 40% will have a negative impact on experience gain in those areas. IE, a stance in shield of 20% will result in aproximately 1/2 the exp gain you normally would get for the same creature. A stance of 0 should prevent any experience gain in that area.
Point has been modified to reflect the location of the item being pointed at. If the item is on the ground, that will be stated, if the item is in the player's possesion that will be stated as well.
The new skinning system which lays the foundation for tanning is currently under test. It started with high level Premium Rangers and has been moving down until as of this writing all Ranger's 15th circle and and above are automatically using the new system, while the others are still using the old system. The level will continue to drop until all Rangers are using it and then the other guilds will be added. As part of this new system, BUNDLE and UNBUNDLE become available. Type BUNDLE HELP if you have access for instructions on how to use these two new verbs. We appreciate your understanding on the slow introduction of this new system so that we do not cause any major problems in game if a problem with the new system is discovered. NOTE: Bundling rope may be accquired at the furriers by asking for it, or at Berolt's for a few coppers.
>bundle helpBUNDLE:
To make a new bundle, you must have a skin, pelt, or other item that you got from skinning in one hand and a rope in the other. To add to the bundle, have the bundle in one hand and the item to be added in the other hand.
Bundles can be sold just like single skins. Use UNBUNDLE to untie the bundle. Be careful, because the UNBUNDLE command dumps all the items in the bundle on the ground.
The AVOID verb has been changed. At the request of the players, certain verbs will now be subject to AVOID that were not effected before. Verbs such as KISS, HOLD, and RUB will now be controlled by the target player if these actions are attempted on them. Further, as this list will grow as deemed necessary, the way AVOID works has been changed as well. It now works the same way SET does. These changes may require you to verify or update your settings on your player. Simply type AVOID to see what they currently are. ALSO, for the sake of screen scroll the room and the target player will not always be messaged that a certain action was blocked. The person attempting the action will simply be messaged that it was blocked.
KISS has been rewritten to allow players to kiss other players on the nose, forehead, neck, and hand. If you don't specify a location, it is a normal kiss. Further changes to be aware of is that you can no longer kiss while hidden or invisible. If you kiss someone while hidden you will reveal yourself. If you kiss someone while invisible you will fade into view momentarily, or fade into view permanently depending on the circumstances.
An event will be taking place in the game starting on or about Wednesday (May 20th) and lasting through Monday (May 25th). Off and on during that time events will occur that you may or may not want to be involved in.
If during this time, an event takes place in your area/room and you do not wish to be a part of it, it is suggested that you log out of the game. Any player remaining in the area/room during an event will be considered a willing participant.
There will be a Ranger Meeting in the Crossing's Amphitheater at 2 pm (PST) / 5 pm (EST), hosted by GameMaster Treveri. All Rangers are invited to attend. There will be no new announcements at this meeting. It's just a regularly scheduled guild meeting. NOTE: This does represent a time change from the original 12 Noon (PST) schedule.
Join us in the Crossing Amphitheater on May 26th at 10:30pm Eastern for a gathering of the Bards!
Among the new spells to be released soon are two that require a little extra description: Fire Rain and Shadow Servant.
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FIRE RAIN cannot be dodged, but there are ways to avoid its devastating effects:
Run! The spell takes a few seconds to warm up before it starts dealing damage.
If you have a shield in hand, the spell will assume you're holding it up to protect yourself from the rain. This is extremely effective, but your Shield skill will be zero for normal attacks while the rain falls and your shield will be lightly damaged if it's non-metal.
Without a shield in hand, Ethereal Shield (or MES) will cut the damage in half, while Sphere of Protection (and ZOP) will reduce it by a third. Either spell combined with a good-sized shield, however, will offer complete protection.
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SHADOW SERVANT has a few quirks which Moon Mages should be aware of before entrusting their items to one.
A Servant will faithfully, but slowly, follow the caster almost anywhere. You need not worry about waiting to let it catch up -- but if you use the Teleport spell or walk through a Moongate, it may become hopelessly confused and stop moving until you return to its location. If you wish your Servant to go through a Moongate, simply PUSH SERVANT and it will stumble through and wait for you on the other side.
Servants hold up to ten items. It considers a container full of stuff to be one item, but be aware that the total weight a Servant carries will affect its speed. You may GIVE an item to a Servant, or ASK for an item it's carrying. If you give it an open container, it will dump it on the ground before accepting it; if you give it food or an item charged with mana it will simply devour it. The only way to tell what it's carrying is to cast Piercing Gaze at it.
Items carried by a Shadow Servant should be safe from creatures, other people, "the janitor," and in theory, crashes. (You may need to summon your Servant again, but if all goes well it should appear with your items intact.) No guarantees are made, however. The staff will not replace items lost for any reason while carried by a Shadow Servant.
Shadow Servant requires 44 mana to cast. This is not a spell for beginners! To determine whether you can harness enough mana, simply HARNESS 44 and then release the mana immediately. Once summoned, a Shadow Servant will stay around until you dismiss it with RELEASE SERVANT. It will either disappear with the items it's carrying or drop them to the ground first. Servants will remain for 15 minutes after you log off or disconnect, but will then disappear with the items they carried.
You've asked for them, and we've listened. By September 1st, 1998, the first individual player homes will become available to our Premium customers!
Choose where you want to live! Homes will range from shacks in crowded, shanty-town slums to expensive standalone mansions!
Customize your home! Choose from hundreds of furniture items to upgrade your home from a basic hovel to a den of luxury. The furniture you purchase will automatically be woven into a room description based on one of many available styles.
Complete privacy for you and your guests! Control the access of familiars and locating spells!
Roleplaying opportunities! Peek into your friends' windows to see if they are home. Light and maintain a fireplace. Eject unwanted guests. Lie on your bed, lean on the wall, sit in a chair!
Homeowners must be Premium customers for 90 consecutive days before they will be eligible to purchase a home, and must maintain their Premium status to keep it. Since the homes will become available by September 1st at the latest, this means you will need to have been Premium as of June 1st to get one the first day. The backdating to June 1st is our way of saying 'Thank You!' to our customers who have maintained their Premium subscriptions until now. (But if you're not Premium now; don't worry. We will have several auctions and releases of new neighborhoods over the first few weeks, so sign up today!)
This is what we have planned for the first release:
Auctions of some of the most desirable home locations to the highest bidders.
After the auctions, free choice of one home per account for all Premium customers who do not already have a home and who meet the 90 day criteria. There will be a minimal in-game registration fee to pay.
The homeowner will have full access to the home, and will be the only one able to purchase upgrades. He or she may designate one guest who will have access to the home at any time, even if the owner is offline.
The outside of each home will be a unique object in the game that may be upgraded and manipulated. Most of the homes will be organized into neighborhoods.
The first homes will contain one room only, but we are designing the system to allow multi-room homes.
Want to get in on the fun? Sign up for Premium today! Still not convinced? More detailed information will be posted on the Simutronics boards in the 'Player Homes' category regularly. Stay tuned!
ATTACK, FIRE, THROW, AIM, DRAW, FEINT (and all the other attacking verbs) have been updated. Now, unless you specify a monster, the default will attack the creature you are FACING. If you specify a monster, you will attack the creature specified. So, ATTACK RAT will not always attack the rat you are FACING, but ATTACK (by itself) will. For instance:
You are in a room facing a goblin. A second goblin saunters in.
You type ATTACK -- this attacks the goblin you are facing (goblin 1).
You type ATTACK GOB -- this attacks the goblin which just entered the room (goblin 2).
A long-standing bug has been fixed, and skins now have realistic weights for their size. This fix not only corrects an old problem but paves the way for the coming tanning system. The new weights of the skins are being tested. If you find a problem, please do not ASSIST or REPORT, but use BUG to let us know.
There will be a Trader's Guild Meeting held on Thursday, June 25th, at 8:00 pm Eastern Time in the Moot Room of the Crossing Trader's Guild.
Being a Master of the guild doesn't mean one stops studying and investigating. Master Silvyrfrost has recently discovered a way of improving the use of Eye of Kertigan, and through magical weavings imparted the enhancement to the enchante. Those bards skilled enough in their craft will now be able to point out those they are capable of spotting using the enchante.
February 8, 1998: Moon Mages with sufficient Power Perception skill now automatically draw mana from any planets within their range of perception. Use PERCEIVE PLANETS to see which are in your range at the time. The amount of mana available depends on the planet's mass and distance and your Power Perception skill. Each planet's distance from Elanthia gradually and continuously changes as it orbits, so the amount of mana contributed will fluctuate over time. Remember, if you're a Moon Mage you can PERCEIVE HELP to see your options.
March 21, 1998: The Aether Lance (Warrior Mage) and Dinazen Olkar (Moon Mage) spells have been released. More spells are on the way!
May 6: The following spells have been released:
| Chain Lightning | (Warrior Mage) |
| Shadowling | (Moon Mage) |
| Heroic Strength | (Paladin) |
| Heart Link | (Empath) |
| Nissa's Binding | (Empath) |
| Aesandry Darlaeth | (Empath) |
May 7: Rather than releasing Hypnosis as a separate spell, it has been merged with Calm. The old Calm spell is now called Hypnotize. To prevent frustration, the spell may be still be referred to as "Calm" when casting.
Mental Blast has been altered so that it *requires* waiting for full prep time.
May 8: After receiving numerous complaints about the Mental Blast change, it's been retracted in favor of raising the minimum mana.
May 13: Mental Blast now works as follows: if you wait for full prep time, the minimum mana is 5. If not, the minimum is 13.
This means a 15-mana cast, waiting for full prep time, is 10 above minimum. Without waiting for full prep time, it's only 2 above minimum and thus less effective. A 5 mana cast at full prep time is as effective as a 13 mana snap-cast.
May 14: If you use TARGET without specifying a target, it will now attempt to default to the creature or player you are engaged to.
May 24: Targetted Magic has been adjusted. All creatures should be somewhat easier to hit, particularly larger ones. Also, the relationship between vitality and critical damage has been adjusted. It's easier to do major critical damage to a small, weak creature such as a rat or goblin, but more difficult to do the same to something as tough as an Adan'f blood warrior.
The Spider Climb spell is now castable on other players and has a longer duration.
June 7: New spells are in the works. See NEWS 16 for details about Fire Rain and Shadow Servant.
June 14: The HARNESS and SPELL verbs have some new options:
HARNESS WARN -- When you prepare a spell, the amount of harness it's going to use when you CAST it is projected. If this is going to use up most of your current harness, you'll be notified. With enough Power Perception skill you get a numeric estimate of how much harness will remain.
HARNESS VERBOSE -- If you have enough Power Perception skill, each time you prepare a spell you're given some idea of how much of your current harness will be consumed.
HARNESS QUIET -- No extra harness messaging (the default).
SPELL RECOGNIZE ON/OFF -- sets whether you recognize spells that you know when prepared by someone else in the room.
June 28: The following spells have been released:
| Clerics: | Uncurse |
| Empaths: | Heal Wounds & Heal Scars |
| Moon Mages: | Shadow Servant |
| Paladins: | Bond Weapon |
| Rangers: | Cheetah Swiftness |
| Warrior Mages: | Fire Rain |
The complete DragonRealms Spell List, including planned spells, can be found at http://shalnhh.home.ml.org.