Hozzászólások - Miklos

Good news, we are almost finished with the programming, we are testing the event now and making sure everything is fine. We are launching it in a few days!

Idézet: Sbart - 2011.01.19. 11:54:52

As the current plan, you do have the chance to capture creatures when you attack for AP! (The idea is that you capture pets which wandered away from fallen doomlords). Yes, there will be a battle, like when you do an epic fight. And yes, you will take damage - so your HP will be a kinda limit.

Baraty is progressing with the programming well, but I am updating with the news we agree here on the forum. On the manacon/building issue, we decided to use this method: when you build, you get building points equal to your manacon or building skill. Of course, this way you do not need 40 building points for maximum reward, but something like 1600.
There is a good chance that the event can begin on next week.

I see one of the main point is still the role of manaconstruction so I will try to reflect on this:

- Allowing manacon for both the clan and for the event. This is quite pointless, then everyone will click it for the event, there is no tactics, thinking, anything, just an automated action. From this, even Sbart's suggestion of entirely removing manacon is better. As I said, if you think your clan deserves manacon more, then use it for the clan, and build from SE. You have the option. I agree Viridiel that this is a cost to your clan, and not to you. And this is exactly the point. You have to decide: what is more important, your advancement or the clans? Attacking for DP has its drawback as well, attacking for AP does not have any yet (but I will think about this).

- You are asking to give advantage to those who have a higher manacon, or greater magic. I was thinking on how to achieve this. As I said, we cant do this with magic, because the higher a players level, the higher is his magic and it would be pretty difficult to put on a relative formulae on this. But with manacon, we can do that if your manacon is less than maximum, then it counts less. So if your manacon is only half of maximum value, it counts 0.5. If its higher than the basic max, then it counts a bit more than 1. Same with what Sbart said, we can do this for the building skill as well. So this way, devoted builders will be rewarded better, as you asked for.

Please also do not forget something very important. Being in the top of these competitions will yield you a medal with a small bonus, but to get the main reward, you have to achieve a specified amount of building which you will be able to get even without manacon.

Other suggestions:
Choosing between either to build or fight sounds a good idea first, but it would be too dangerous - it can easily happen that too few player chooses an option and then the event fails because of this.


Stekkos, I responded to this post earlier, the problem was I could not figure out a relic which could worth hundreds of APts. Actually, it would have been either the relic worth it, and then everyone spends all his ap on the event. Or it doesnt, and then no one does. AP can be calclulated to SE, as the relics power would be calculated as well, and it would be easy to compare.

Sorry guys Im on holidays and have a very limited access to internet, thats why I asked Kethios and Random to answer your questions meanwhile. But let me try to clear up the most basic questions:

Stekkos: You say the event shouldnt give SE for the attacks, but the reward should be so good so it worth it. We tried this, in the first, original round of the Zarknod event on the HUN servers. But investing hundeds of APs in the event means losing millions of SE. We could not create such a powerful reward which would worth it. Thats why we try to give back most of the investment and give a reward in addition. You still lose HP, you have to heal yourself, and you can do the attacks when your HP is high enough, so people can steal the SE you get from the attacks. So I agree with the concept you suggested, and that was my plan also, but players had different needs and thats the most important what players want.

About the manaconstruction issue: manaconstructions effect increases exponentially as you level up and your magic increases. We cant set a number here, like 1000 manaconstruction equals 1 build, because whatever number we would set, would be either too easy for high level chars, or too difficult to low level ones. I do agree that manaconstruction is a very valuable resource for the advancement of your clan. Thats why we want to put players at a choice here: be a team player, and use manacon for the clan, and do the building from your own SE - or be selfish, and use the free manacon for your own good during the event. If you think that manacon is too valuable to waste for the event - simply do the building from SE. It will not be a waste, it will improve your luck as building for your clan would. We could make things more complicated, saying the efficiency of building depends on your building skill, but in fact, those who are in a clan has maxed their building out anyway, building character or not, so we wanted to keep things as simple as possible.
I do agree that those that only build and do not attack will be at a disadvantage compared to those who both attack and build. But even if you are not a "dueler" you have the equipment and stats to defeat epics, entities, dimension door creatures and as such, will have no problem beating the xeno queens.


There is a misunderstanding, you get a potion after every 12 wins, but there are 5 different potions. So you get this bonus for 60 wins, not for 12. So thats an effective 10% bonus only (if you won all 60 attacks).

Viridel: the main styles are not "attacking" and "builder" characters in this game. Some players prefer pvp (fighting other players) others prefer pve (focusing on character development). There are no primary characters who enjoy nothing else but clicking manacon once a day and spending all their SE on building, there are no primary characters with twice as high magic as others so they can build better, for a simple reason - these actions come with no character development, these are tools which can be used to strengthen the clan, and as such, every member of the clan will build as much as then can. Any player who is 'good at combat', will have a maximalized manacon.

The building aspect was not added to the event to make it viable for secondary characters with only 20s abilties and no skills but manacon and building, but to give the event more variety, more ways to compete for characters who really play the game.

"So I thought all players in one category would fight the same epic creature. Isn't it the case?"
Yes they will fight the same creature with the same hp but it will have slightly different stats if you are level 31 or 39 to make it a fair fight.

"Do you have an estimated time as to when this event may start?"
The programmer started working on it, will take 2-3 weeks at most.

Thanks for your comments and questions!

Space-rift potion directly exchanges your EH and DD. So if you had an EH, you will have a DD instead. So with each potion, you can swith it to here and there.

The +1% squeeze simply increases the SE you get when squeezing.

Multiple medals of doom stack.

We decided that the focus crystal will be removable (but will last only for half year - until the next turn of this same event), and only 1 will be awarded. We also drop the pet equipment and cake (too weak items), and add something more fun rewards to the list (decrease infection, temporal bonus the AA points etc)

The manaconstruction will count 1 for everyone - it costs the same for everyone anyway, and we want to make this so players of all levels can participate with nearly equal chance. Even so, level 3 characters will not make it to the top ten, as you state correctly: "Low level players don't have so many duel/action points..."

"dedicated builder"
Sorry, there is no "building only" character in my dictionary only "slaves", "multies" are who only build. A normal player does other things besides building, like adventures, quests, duels, dimension door etc.

"What happens if I start the event at level 29 and go up to 32 during the 3 weeks?"
No, you will stay in the category you started off at the beginning. In any case, the epic you fight will be designed so you have a good chance to defeat it, regardless of your level.

"Builders will either have to choose to help their Clan -or- participate in the event"
Yes this is a valid point, actually, it sounded fun that players have to make a choice. Btw, if you are dedicated to your clan (and why you wouldnt be), you can still build for SE, and use your manacons for your clan.

This is still the first design, we are discussing it now, some things will change for sure. Kethios will keep you updated on any news.

Xeno wars
We finished the development documentation for the new event planned for this month. Here is a short extract of it, please feel free to comment it, especially reward power and comparison of rewards.

Duration: 3 weeks.
There will be categories, for level 3-10, 11-20, 21-30 etc. Each category gets an epic opponent to defeat. If they win, they can help the next higher category. If that is dead as well, they can help the next lower category, etc. Attacks cost APt or DPt. If you win: in case of APt, you get the SE and XP you would get for a normal hunt (including quiz bonus, if you answered the quiz in advance under Hunt). In case of PPt, you get SE and XP only if you have EH skill (as if you defeated a doomlord 0-10 less level than you). Pets get experience and morale. For every 12 victories, you get a small potion reward (+3 APts, +3 DPts, healing, mana, and 5 crystal points). Besides combat, you can build as well. Each manaconstruction (with full mana) counts as 1 build. You can also build for a fix amount SE (roughly equivalent to 3 hunts), and that counts as 1 build as well.
Rewards: You can choose from the reward list 1 item depending on victories, and 1 item depending on building.
You get level 1 reward from 100 victories, level 2 from 200, level 3 from 300, and level 4 from 400. If until the end of the event attaining 400 victories will not be possible, the limits will be lowered. For building, level 1 reward needs 10 builds, level 2 needs 20, level 3 needs 30, level 4 needs 40.
If after the 3 weeks there are any xeno motherqueens alive, there is no reward at all.
Reward list:
2 ring focus crystals: +2, +4, +6, +8% soul-draining (only if you don't have the following focus crystal!)
2 necklace focus cryszals: +2, +4, +6, +8% soul-draining (only if you don't have the above focus crystal!)
1, 2, 3, 4% bonus for half year to quest reward SE
2, 4, 6, 8% bonus for half year to AA points
spacerift potion (switches your Energy Harness with Disadvanced Development skill or vica versa at no cost): 3, 6, 9, 12 potions.
soul diamonds: level x 50, level x 100, level x 150, level x 200.
increase or decrease infection by 1, 2, 3, 4%
10, 20, 30, 40 bonus to trade skill for half year (but does not increase the skill beyond maximum)
Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum motivating whip: Your pets gain experience faster for half year, by 5, 10, 15, 20%
Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum anti-magic void: Your magic absorption increases by 5, 10, 15, 20% for half year.
Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum tiara of dread: During duels, for the next half year, the absorption of your opponent's pets decreases by 4, 8, 12, 16%.

Top lists: there will be 3 top lists. Most victories, most builds, and a fun stat, most unconscious pets. Every top lists will show the top 10 in that category, and they will get a small extra reward at the end of the event. Most victories: xeno combat medal (+10 execution), Most building: medal of doom (+ building, -1 sec to hunt), Most unconscious pets: squeezing medal (+1% soul energy squeezing)

Additional info:
- building the prison increases your clan's soul-well
- xeno motherqueen's regeneration depends on how much time passed, they get weaker later and regenerate slower
- the efficiency of prison building also depends on time, the weaker the mother queen, the faster the building goes
- you can find singular anomalities during xeno-fights for the clan quest
- capturing pets during xeno fights count towards Temple of Doom task
- you can acquire helm shard for xeno fights just like for hunts
- killing a xeno works as a prerequisite for rolling the wheel of fortune
- killing a xeno does not count as hunting for the Temple of Doom

In such games, there are 3 main ways of cheating:

1.) Finding a program bug and exploiting it. Fortunately, our programmer, Baraty is pretty good on this side, bugs are very rare and are quickly corrected. Also we log most things, so many events can be backtracked. So actually there were only 2 times in DL's history (on the original servers) when someone found a serious bug and started cheating with it, both times they were catched and banned permanently.

2.) Using multiple characters to achieve advantage. This is a huge weakness of such games, where you can start free characters very easily. Fortunately, we were pretty prepared for this from the start. We not only have logs which track specifically activities like this, but we have two sophisticated programs which analyze these log files, collect data, and make suggestions to the GM on actions against players who do this. We catched and banned most people who tried to abuse this seriously.

3.) Using "third party programs" ie. scripts, to automate game mechanics, and collect data to make things easier. This is the hardest to catch. We cannot install spying programs on your computer to see what programs you are running. We can only log what you are doing while you play, and try to determine if this is a human player, or some automated script. Even if it is a script, there are many ways to make it so smart so its almost impossible to catch with automated detection programs. The only reliable way is to parse through all logs manually and decide if there is scripting or not. Some scripts are pretty harmless, like tracking clan members build total, or putting out hotkeys. But there are means ones, which click duel every 10 seconds on the same player for an hour, or download the entire toplist once every few hours, analyze the data, and make suggestion which player is hunting and should be attacked. Preventing all these without also hindering honest players is pretty difficult, if not impossible. I discussed with Baraty what we can do in the future to automatize the detection of such scripts. But meanwhile, dont forget, we can always check logs manually - if someone overabuse this, and we get complaints, we will spend the time and look through all the logs.

Idézet: Valkyrie - 2010.12.20. 20:04:25

This wasn't an exploit, just a bug caused by the last patch, and the programmer already corrected it, thank you for the notice.

About MsPiggy. We took very seriously the complaints, and monitored and logged every action for the past 2 months. After careful examination and analyzation of this data, we decided to suspend this character temporarily. Further investigation will decide if this suspension will become permanent.

We have added to the game the option to transfer characters between players. You can xfer your char to another registered user, if he/she does not have a character on that world. Transfer costs 50 ancient stones, and all remaining stones and items which can be sold for ancient stones will be destroyed during the transfer (so xferring ancient stones between players is still not allowed, even this way). Transfer is available under Settings.

We also added a new button to the Pets screen, Exercise all fighting pets.

We added the missing description to Adventures, Designing Adventures, and Entities (the ones you can challenge when your Epic Monument is built to level 2).

The time has come, the map event will start again soon! You can register for 1 week, if you are at least level 2, in the Misc menu, clicking on the map.

The event will start on 6th of Dec, 2010, Monday, 15pm GMT+1 (9am EST).

You can register until the start, you CANNOT register after the event has begun. The event itself lasts for 30 days.

This is a competition, you can join one of the 4 teams. The winner team gets the most powerful relic, the 2nd gets the next etc. Under the map menu, you find a detailed description.

For those who participated in the previous event, I list the changes:

1.) You CANNOT register after the event has begun. Registration period is 7 days. Entry fee gets more expensive with each day passed.
2.) There is no limit to the number of players in a team like previously. But during registration, you don't see the number of participants.
3.) During the event, those who already won get a handicap. Those who won a golden prize get a 0.8x multiplier to map finding chance, those who get a silver get 0.9x, those who get a bronze get no modifier, those who didn't win get a 1.1x multiplier.
4.) At the huckster, you see a team power number, this is an indication of average power of those who registered so far, and relies on number of Apts, Dpts, and Apt and Dpt regeneration rate, plus possible handicap multiplier.
5.) Climbing skill does not modify the map finding chance. Instead, there is a map finding skill, and the soul-huckster will sell a Wand of map-finding soon which can increase the chance as well.
6.) The chance to find a map piece still depends on the team number, and is modified by the handicap multiplier.
7.) One of the relics have been replaced.
8.) If you collect a given number of map pieces (50-80, depending on team number), you will get a better grade prize than your team (unless you are already first).

Maybe you did not understand what I said, D00ml0rd. Like nuclear power can be used to the benefit of the human race, it can be used to devastate it as well. If this could have been a strategy of farmed people to strike back to spiders that wouldnt have been a problem. But some characters (not average players, but specialized characters) started using this against average, non-spider characters.

About spiders, check out the AA abilities, like Experience or Slow time, those are pretty good weapons to use anyway.

Stekkos: thanks for the notice, I corrected it, new max level for training and ramparts is 30.

About the preventorixpicus, I had the very same viewpoint as you had for a long time. "Stuffing XP" is a nice way to retalitate to the "evil" spiders. I changed my viewpoint when some players went extreme with this. And not only against "spiders", but against an entire clan, average players. They made fun out of attacking everyone for days every hour. Some players went to holiday for a week and when he came back he advanced a few levels - without getting any SE So as you see every coin has two sides.

On the other hand, if someone wears this ring, he loses the stats from a real combat ring. Also, you can attack him without worrying to lose SE (and you can gain your share with EH). And thirdly, there is a counterpart - the AA ability "Experience" which is pretty easy to buy, and gives XP to those who harass you.

I will forward those to the programmer, Stekkos and ChaoticGemini and will be corrected tomorrow.

Idézet: D00ml0rd - 2010.11.18. 18:11:10
Its not a bug. These items are used in the alchemy labor (see description when your clan builds it)

Idézet: D00ml0rd
Ok, here is a little explanation. Some playes follow the strategy of getting best SE/XP ratio, to become as powerful compared to their own level as possible. This item somewhat supports this strategy, as disadvanced development does. If you are afraid that player will attack you just "to give you XP", and make your SE/XP ratio less optimal, you can choose to wear this. A little weird thing, I know, but on the old server someone got attacked twice every hour and gained a few levels just because some ppl were giving him xp

Idézet: LydonB - 2010.11.18. 20:37:01
You pay mana because the option actually does multiple things: if you can buy a higher level potion by mind boosting your trade skill, it does that for you as well (and you dont have to pay the mana cost of boosting back to the original skill). If you couldnt buy a better potion with mind boosting the trade skill, there would be no spell cost.

We are launching a new map event very soon, this new skill was patched in as a preparation for this. I wrote a description for the skill, you can see it now if you move the cursor over it.

Today we had a huge patch, and added many improvements to the game. Here is the full list:

Many clan buildings maximum level has been increased. The additional levels often bring new functions. Higher level kennel makes possible for your pets to learn their own skills! Magic hunt increases your pets resistance to magic, palace increases leadership and gives additional dresses, dimension gate increases number of DG points and the SE you get for DG monsters, grandmaster architecture further increase the maximum of ramparts and training grounds. New treasury levels make it possible to challenge earlier epic monsters. There are also two new buildings. Pyramid of glory is only a role-playing building giving titles to players. Alchemy laboratory makes it possible to find essences when you squeeze creatures for soul-energy. You may also combine essences to create ultra-essences, and combine ultra-essences to create mega-essences which give permanent beneficial effects to your character.

On the clan page, we splitted the buildings into two groups, finished buildings, and buildings under construction.

Pets received a new button: cheer up to 21% morale. If you lose a pet equipment you purchased for soul diamonds (either by replacing it or losing the pet) you get back 35% of the soul diamonds you spent on it.

We added a full new alternate advancement system to the game. It is available to players from level 60. At this time, a button "AA points" will show up on your menu to the left. Whenever you get experience points, you will get some AA points as well. You can use these points to purchase unique abilites. There are so many abilities, you can't have all, so you have to choose wisely.

We added the option to the hunt window that you can answer quiz questions in advance, when not hunting.

Added new relics and misc. items to the soul-huckster. For example now you can buy special keys, so you can use one answered quiz question to cover multiple hunts.

Energy harness has been improved, now it gives the same amount of SE whether your opponent is at 20% or 100% on your duel list. Also, on world 3, if the SE you would get with EH is more than the normal maximum, you will get the EH SE.

Now you can change your name under settings (but at a cost).

We added a new comfort function available to everyone. In the dimension gate, you can reset the gate for 1/3 stone or 1 APt, and immediately enter with a single button now.

We added a facebook share button to important events, like advancing a level, capturing a pet, or defeating an epic. Showing this button can be turned off under Settings.

Added a confirm button if you want to sell an epic item in the auction house.

Repeatable quests have been balanced a bit so they will be equally difficult to complete, and we added 2 new repeatable quests.

Helping hand does not give constitution and magic anymore.

We finished the patch, the above changes went live, except for the quiz categorization and battle sharing, those will be patched in a few days as well. I hope you enjoy the new improvements.

Here is the list of the new developments. These will go live tomorrow, with the patch (they are not live yet!)

Many clan buildings maximum level has been increased. The additional levels often bring new functions. Higher level kennel makes possible for your pets to learn their own skills! Magic hunt increases your pets resistance to magic, palace increases leadership and gives additional dresses, dimension gate increases number of DG points and the SE you get for DG monsters, grandmaster architecture further increase the maximum of ramparts and training grounds. New treasury levels make it possible to challenge earlier epic monsters. There are also two new buildings. Pyramid of glory is only a role-playing building giving titles to players. Alchemy laboratory makes it possible to find essences when you squeeze creatures for soul-energy. You may also combine essences to create ultra-essences, and combine ultra-essences to create mega-essences which give permanent beneficial effects to your character.

On the clan page, we splitted the buildings into two groups, finished buildings, and buildings under construction.

Pets received a new button: cheer up to 21% morale. If you lose a pet equipment you purchased for soul diamonds (either by replacing it or losing the pet) you get back 35% of the soul diamonds you spent on it.

We added a full new alternate advancement system to the game. It is available to players from level 60. At this time, a button "AA points" will show up on your menu to the left. Whenever you get experience points, you will get some AA points as well. You can use these points to purchase unique abilites. There are so many abilities, you can't have all, so you have to choose wisely.

We added a new mini-game to the quiz aspect of Doomlord. Players can not only answer quiz questions, they can categorize them as well. When enough players categorized a specific question, we determine who categorized it correctly (same category as most people) and reward those. Please note that categorizing is NOT MANDATORY, you can submit the answer without categorizing!
Reward is soul energy, awarded along with recommendation SE every day, and displayed on the same screen. It might take several days or even a week after you categorized a question to receive the award. We will also keep track of your successful categorizations. For every 250, you will get a quiz medal (but you can get no more than 8 quiz medals this way). For players with "Faster quiz" option enabled, every categorization counts as double, same for quiz admins (since they have to reject some questions).

We added the option to the hunt window that you can answer quiz questions in advance, when not hunting.

Added new relics and misc. items to the soul-huckster. For example now you can buy special keys, so you can use one answered quiz question to cover multiple hunts.

Energy harness has been improved, now it gives the same amount of SE whether your opponent is at 20% or 100% on your duel list. Also, on world 3, if the SE you would get with EH is more than the normal maximum, you will get the EH SE.

Now you can change your name under settings (but at a cost).

We added a new comfort function available to everyone. In the dimension gate, you can reset the gate for 1/3 stone or 1 APt, and immediately enter with a single button now.

You can share your battles of choice so anyone can view them. Under combats, there is a new icon for this. You can share any type of combat exept for arena, even challenges

We added a facebook share button to important events, like advancing a level, capturing a pet, or defeating an epic. Showing this button can be turned off under Settings.

Added a confirm button if you want to sell an epic item in the auction house.

Repeatable quests have been balanced a bit so they will be equally difficult to complete, and we added 2 new repeatable quests.

Helping hand does not give constitution and magic anymore.