Rehdon

Exactly. No need to send the whole list, and I guess any search would give a far smaller number of items, so that there's little load on the server (just like the #know <pattern> command works). If this has to wait until the next client update (don't know what it takes to change behavior of #sto ...), would it be possible that #sto doesn't interrupt harvesting in the meanwhile? I'm otherwise very glad with browsing the store window away from store. Rehdon

Nice ideas. Last time I didn't have much fun because I'm too weak for high level monsters (sadly I missed the previous day invasion) and after a while I got tired of the underwold to and fro. Will try to follow some of them next time. Fact is, a Mage character really isn't possible at the present moment in EL: magic is the ancillary skill of the fighter, but like alchemy it grows "naturally" every time you cast a restoration or a ttpr spell. It would be nice if this skill could mature to produce a true Mage character. The suggestion forum is full of requests for new spells (I posted some myself ), so I'd say this is something people would like to see happen. Hope the next client(s) will bring some improvement in this area as well. Rehdon

That alone is a nice improvement (especially if you like good screenshots Rehdon

I am fine with the new behavior of the #sto command (much more useful than the old, endless item list), but add me to the list of those who'd also like a comeback of good, old #sto <item> Rehdon

Hi all, I voted both "Yes, everything works fine" and "No problems at all" because I only had two minor glitches: installation: had to move by hand the relevant files (chatlog, map notes) to the .elc/main folder playing the game: one isolated crash (map change) Other than that, everything is working perfectly in my current setup (Centrino Duo, nVidia 7600 graphic card, Ubuntu Linux operating system). Thanks again to all the developers! Rehdon

Yep, can't wait to have those. But I'd say this is a significant improvement under many regards (engineering almost fully operational, more space in storage, new sound system, 3D improvements, minimap etc.). I sort of tended to forget it because I used a CVS-compiled version with most of the new goodies, yesterday I tried the old 1.40 version and the difference shows. To those who aren't happy with the new looks: experiment a little with the perspective slider (Adv Video tab of the preference window) increasing the default, you'll be surprised to see how it can influence your perception of the 3D models (and of the 3D world surrounding it). Rehdon

HI guys, I have exactly the same problem (that Ignoble has) and found out that you can change gamma for the whole desktop, included EL, using the nvidia-settings utility. Don't know if there's a similar tool for ATI cards, sorry. Rehdon

Hi all, at the present moment the magic skill is one of the hardest to master and to progress in. A quick search on the forum shows that a) people would very much like the skill to be improved and expanded usually people think of expanding it by adding more (specific) spells. Indeed the pure mage character (but also the warrior-mage combination) is conspicuosly absent from the game, and that's a real shame. I'd like to suggest a simple way to enhance the magic system by adding a very small number of sigils, so that it would be worthwile for a player to specialize in the magic arts. First of all, the current magic is very well thought out and flexibile: basically you need the combination of one or more sigils and a handful of ingredients to cast a good number of spells. You could take advantage of this "modular" spell composition to create an extremely flexible pool of attack/defense spells. This is how it'd work: 1. Add a small number of "object" sigils You can add more later on, of course, but even adding only two (initially) would be more than enough for the purpose of revamping the magic sub-system. Let's say these sigils represent the "ideal", magical form of some every day objects, a sort of empty container that could be filled with different types of magic energy. The initial object sigils would be: arrow and wall. 2. Define the basic spell pattern New spells using these sigils would take this form: ACTION + OBJECT + ELEMENT So using the Create Wall Fire would result in casting a Wall of fire spell, Create Arrow Fire in a Fire arrow spell, Remove (or Destroy) Wall Fire would cause the destruction of a fire wall created by someone else, and so on. Not all combination might be desirable or effective, in the which case the spell simply wouldn't be possible. Note that use of elemental attack/defense spells would fit in very well with new, elemental-based creatures: you'd use a wall/arrow of water (well, assuming it'd turn in ice of course against a salamander of fire, or fire arrows against ice creatures like Yetis, etc. 3. Define advanced spell patterns If the system works, it could be expanded very effectively simply by making possible more complex patterns. That could mean using some of the other existing sigils: ACTION + CONDITION + OBJECT + ELEMENT You could then have a Temporary wall of fire, which would last only a few minutes and cost less than a Permanent wall of fire, that f.i. could last until the caster leaves the map or another wizard dispells it. Another possibility could be that of combining more than object: ACTION + OBJECT + ELEMENT + OBJECT Using Create Wall Fire Arrow would create a wall of burning arrows, for instance. 4. Define specific effects for object sigils You'd have to define how wide a magic wall should be, for instance, and the damage it would inflict to those trying to bypass it. Also specify how "temporary" is Temporary, etc. 5. Define spell cost So far every spell has a specific cost, I'd propose that the cost be the sum of single sigils used: this way, the more complicated and powerful the spell, the more mana points you have to burn. Another criterium could be the position in the spell pattern: the second sigil would cost more than the first, the third more than the second, and so on. 6. Define spell ingredients This one should be pretty straightforward: energy and/or matter essences for the objects, fire essence for fire etc. Again, particularly complex spell would require a larger number of ingredients. That's the basic idea, hope you like it. Expanding the magic system this way would allow for the birth of a true mage PC. Combined with the new graphical effects, the new spells would look gorgeous: I would love to see the graphical implementation of a Wall of poisoned blades, or a Torrent of ice darts, and the like... Rehdon

Good idea. I think even low- to middle-power CPUs would benefit from this saving (seeing that the EL process takes 90% of the CPU on my lowly sempron box). Rehdon

Looking at your stats; get the cape... unless there's some neg perks u are willing to take to make up for the pp's.You still need 8 more pp's on p/c, IMO, for optimum* clops/fluffy training (for eg. 28/44 p/c) May want to consider buying 4 Reasoning removal stones too Thanks for the advice. I actually spent 4 pp in reasoning in anticipation for archery (needing perception) but unfortunately it didn't make it into the next client update. Which is why I was sort of thinking about a reset, and then taking the NMT perk. But of course perception will be useful in the future (hopefully) for archery, so it would probably make more sense just to wait a little ... Rehdon

I very much like this idea, defending Idaloran city by repeated waves of invasors. It would be even better with archery implemented Rehdon

Very interesting thread, thank you all for your suggestions. My question is: would you suggest that an all-rounder like me (my stats are public) take the perk or just wait until I grow rich enough (hopefully ...) to buy the cape? I think what's been said so far concerns true fighters/pkers mostly. Rehdon

What problem, exactly, are we trying to solve here? It can't be that the cape is becoming "too common" because if it really were prices would go down, instead they're growing steadily. Saying "there are more than X" doesn't help much in assessing the effect that those capes are having on the game. I doubt that X-50 or X+50 would change much in the general economy of the game but, again, I'm just assuming. The fact is, items break even with an NMT cape: it's just a matter of time. And, if there are too many high level items (I still fail to see how that can be considered a problem, but anyway) there are other means to achieve a reduction, as the most recent invasions have shown. It's all a matter of balance. In a world were items are breakable, even the more expensive ones, those you worked a lot to buy/produce, an item that helps saving your items is a very appreciated way to fight entropy (no pun intended . And it's understandable that it has become one of the most desired items in the game. Making the NMT unbreakable was a wise move and the logical counterweight to item loss by attrition. I don't see how putting it on the same level as all other items is going to help. Rehdon

Hi all, I am auctioning off a physique removal stone. Initial price 20K gc, min increment 2K gc, buy now 40k gc. Auction closes Wednesday at 16:00 CET (i.e. 3 pm GMT). Post here your offer, or PM me in-game or in-forum (I will keep the current best bid up to date in this message, bidder will be kept hidden unless explicitly told to reveal it). I reserve the right not to sell if no reasonable offer is made. Update: current highest bidder is masterpiter! Rehdon EDIT: corrected auction end time (cut and pasted from an older announcement).

Hi all, I am auctioning off a physique removal stone. Initial price 20K gc, min increment 2K gc. Auction closes Friday at 18:00 CET (i.e. 5 pm GMT). Post here your offer, or PM me in-game or in-forum (I will keep the current best bid up to date in this message, bidder will be kept hidden unless explicitly told to reveal it). I reserve the right not to sell if no reasonable offer is made. Rehdon

The invasion was fun, but perhaps a little chaotic: if you follow a sort of progression, from weaker to stronger creature (not necessarily perfect) apprentice fighters will start with the easy part, and experienced fighters will kick in when the tougher monsters appears. The risk, OTOH, is to have too rigid a schema for every invasion ... Anyway, glad I took part in it! Rehdon

Nope, although I seem to remember something going back to the times when I still used an Amiga ... My suggestions are derived from a pen, paper and dice RPG I created with a friend of mine (Usl, who else? ) out of dissatisfaction with the original D&D game. We wanted it to be classless (in particular we always disliked tying classes to races as original D&D proposed and imposed, bleah!), with a simpler fighting mechanism (only 10 sided dice for everything, in a single throw you could determine if you'd wounded you opponent and by how much) and a more complex magic framework. In actual use, it worked quite well, and mages were not the "jettison until you need them" of the party. Most important, we felt very much more "free" to pursue and explore our inclinations. This is true to an extent for EL as well: classless, nice fighting mechanism, nice potential for the magic system (very similar to the one we wrote). Hope it will receive more attention in the (near) future Rehdon

Nice idea, I guess my "rune stones" proof of concept falls in the general category you described. Alhtough my inspiration comes from traditional, pen and paper RPG games (where you can have parchments, rings etc. to allow non-magic users to cast spells) and, wrt EL, from summoning stones (in fact they would be perfect equivalent for the magic skill). Rehdon

Nope, magical stones similar to summoning stones: the mage casts a spell on a stone, a rune-like[1] symbol is engraved on the stone (so that you can distinguish among different stones) and another character can use the stone to cast the spell. Again, like summoning stones it doesn't matter if the spell is way beyond the magical abilities of the PC using the stone. Rehdon [1] Runes were the original alphabet of the Germanic peoples, their origin is not fully known but we know that they were linked to magic practices. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rune]the Wikipedia page on runes[/url].

Neat idea! Let's have totally random effects, no real new spell and a chance to blow up every item in the caster inventory! I'm sure that would greatly expand and enhance the magic skill as lots of people have been asking Rehdon

Adding a suitable object sigil, let's call it Ball, you could have that kind of spells simply using Create Fire|Water|Air|Earth|Energy Ball: first two give you fireball and iceball spells, using Air you could produce a tornado, using Earth a rock fall, an electrical storm with Energy, etc. Using a Time sigil you could cast your spell and have it go off after a specific period of time: imagine casting a fireball and then having it explode among the mob of angry pkers who're chasing you Another possibility (using the Matter sigil?) would be to "imprison" a spell in a magical stone, so that someone else could use the stone and cast it with the power of the mage who created the stone, very much like people use summoning stones. You could imagine magical runes engraved on the stones, so let's call them Rune stones Again, the devs patience and imagination is the limit. The system could be kept in check by the mana requirements: more powerful spells should cost a lot, to the point that some of them could only be cast with the help of a Crown of Mana (whose usefulness would get a boost, I'm sure). Rehdon

I'm always on the look for new things to build and new skills in EL, even if I still can't/don't plan to build or learn them. Lately some of the new formulas for engineering and the one for spear left me scratching my head: Nails This is an unspecified quantity, so the fact that 2 iron bars are required will be justified if not too many nails will be required for other objects/building. Only 7 xp seems a bit few IMHO, should be raised a little, it would also cover the gap between nails and saltpetre. Caltrop/Poisoned caltrop Basically these are retorted metal wires/fragments IRL, why should death essences be needed (in such a quantity, at least) to build them? I reduce or get rid of them altogether for caltrops, leaving 1-2 for poisoned caltrops. Snare This also is puzzling IMHO, why 6 magic essences to build a snare? Dung Since I'm on it, it feels weird that you have to have harvest level 80 or more to harvest (in an effective way) ... dung!!! Spear The spear was a very simple weapon to build, and for a long time it was the typical weapon of the low rank warrior, as swords and shield were too expensive to be mass produced. But the required ingredients in EL are those of very high end swords: 1 Wooden Staff, 2 Titanium Bars, 1 Steel Bar, 2 Wolfram Bars, 2 Serpent Stones, 30 Fire Essences. I really can't make sense of this, why all that very precious wolfram? why the serpent stones? The formula for a basic spear I'd suggest would be 1 Wooden Staff, 2 Steel Bar, 5 leather; of course the stats would be completely different, especially wrt damage (as they are now they don't make it a a very attractive weapon IMHO, so requiring all that stuff is even more strange). More expensive/rare ingredients could then be required for more powerful kind of spears. Note that I'm not complaining just for the sake of having easier stuff to produce: I know engineering is supposed to be an expensive and requiring skill, but that can be accomplished in other ways. You could raise the nexus required to build some items, for instance, perhaps adding some magic nexus for high-end items as well. Books are already expensive for engineering, so that's not a beginner skill anyway. And I know that the game doesn't have to be 100% realistic, which would be impossible and not very fun probably, but when some features/items are too far from reality (or even the shared "vision" of non-real items, such as magic objects) producing/using them leaves me, and I suppose others, a bit uncomfortable with them, a feeling of artificiality which detracts from gameplay. Well, end of rant, nothing to see here, move along Rehdon

Never say ever But seriously, I think Ent hinted about it some time ago, so I believe it will happen sooner or later. Thanks, will dig it up out of curiosity. Rehdon

Except that the processing of dung -> saltpeter (potassium nitrate) happens in the engineering skill, not when it's harvested. I think Entropy has a partial purification going on during harvesting, and he's taking a shortcut also. In reality you aren't harvesting the dung, just some of the components found in the dung heaps. While I surely don't want to delve deeper in this matter (pun intended ) it feels a bit too difficult anyway. The explanation is reasonable, but perhaps the 80+ harvest level is (somewhat) higher than needed. In any case, although this makes things clearer about harvesting dung, I wonder why the level of realism varies wildly between different objects/skills: see what I wrote about the spear; to quote an example wrt skills making blackpowder, strictly speaking, is a classic alchemist thing; harvesting tin and making bronze objects, moreover, shouldn't be harder than iron, for well known historical reasons; etc.[1] I understand that the reason why these little inconsistencies creep in the game is due to its growing bit by bit, but I hope there will be a sort of object and skill reordering one day, I would gladly accept the inconvenience of it if it were to produce a better EL world. Rehdon [1] Forgot to mention the weirdest thing I've found so far in the game: mining minerals using swords! I'm sure there must be some reason for that, but couldn't come up with one yet ;D

My friend and guildie sonteard (of >FA<) asked for access to the forums, please approve him. Rehdon