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Ishu - Good evening and welcome to another great Stratics House of Commons chat, tonight our guests are the developers of Horizons! The topic of discussion is Dragon Lairs, Fall Festival, and Client Issues.

Ishu - Please send your questions to [QT]Erusun- to do so type /query NICK and type in the window that pops up. Questions sent to me or the developers will not make it into the lineup. Full logs of the chat will be up on http://hz.stratics.com shortly after the chat.

Ishu - We'll start with a brief introduction from the developers, now would be a good time to send those questions.

DavidBowman - Hi everyone, I'm David Bowman. CEO and Creative Director for Horizons/Tulga Games

AmonGwareth - I'm Jason Murdick, Designer for Horizons

Amadan - Hey all. I'm Jim Poole, Live Event Creator.

Smeglor - I'm Adrian LaVallee, technical designer and simulation/database programmer.

Manga - I'm Mark Vargas, Design Lead for Horizons, creator of server rollbacks and banned from using macros on the live shards

Ishu - Arcat Lairs: Will lairs be delayed on Unity due to the "more-than-one-plot-per-account" bug? (I'm aware GN has the final word on this, but are there technical limitations e.g. plot reclamation didn't run yet)

DavidBowman - We'll deliver the data and update to GN as is normal. They will apply it at their discretion. We will try to help them where possible, but we cannot run our plot reclaiming routines on their setup.

Ishu - Varangaard question: What are your medium-to-long range plans regarding the HZ client and the issue of insufficient FPS on many systems?

DavidBowman - We've been making steady improvements for most customers, with our latest version making a significant difference for many in memory usage. We have the right developers working on the client performance, and they will continue to deliver changes that are focused on fps, memory usage and texture memory. Long range we are currently developing a new client for our future/present products.

Ishu - *C`gan* Will masks submitted after the cutoff date possibly still make it in game?

Amadan - Masks that have been submitted after the cutoff date will not be used for the current Event. Players are more than welcome to submit more masks to Baela@istaria.com but would be worth saving for future contests.

Ishu - *Nodaken* whats the timeline for lairs to be complete roughly?

DavidBowman - We have a 52 point checklist for Lairs and are down to 5 remaining issues on the checklist. Today's latest delta capture which will go to Blight today corrects 1 more of those. We have exported all of the Helian assets, and are waiting to export the Lunus assets when the Helians all check out. Our Blight testers will begin general testing with Illy early next week, when we patch out the large numbers of assets in the Helian Lairs.

Ishu - *Ahura* Are the Crystal and Lair shaping techs and forms of lower tiers going to be purchasable off of the Dragon crafter trainer and Quarter master? If not, why was that desicion made?

AmonGwareth - Yes, Tiers 1 through 3 of the Crystalshaping and Lairshaping techniques will be available on the Quartermaster. They have been added with the patch that is being applied to the test shard this evening.

Ishu - *Arcat* Client: Would it be possible to release a quick and dirty manual/howto covering resource overrides? (what can be overridden, where are the limits - icons/mappaks/music don't fully work yet in override - some files get 'ignored').

Manga - We can work on gettting a small guide in our knowledge base or web site explaining the features of the resource override folder.

Ishu - *Samael Lairs* Has a date been determined for bidding to start on Lairs?

DavidBowman - we plan on 1 week after general release to Live

Ishu - *C`gan* Are all lairs going to be the same pricing method as regular plots?

DavidBowman - No. Their prices will be in the comparable ranges to that of plots, but the calculation will be based on volume, not area.

Ishu - Varangaard Fall Harvest: the recently published wallpaper appears to promise the return of a fan-favorite mob. Can you tell anything about what we could expect of the event, or is it all hush-hush? :)

DavidBowman - Amadan is typing...

Amadan - You can expect lots of things from the event. There is a very in-depth quest which involves the fan-favorite monster and a new type of monster. There are lots of little things to do with the Fall Harvest Festival. Players should really enjoy everything the event has in store for them.

Ishu - Murmandamus Lair testing question: Will it be possible for those with plots on the live shards to help test Lairs on Blight?

DavidBowman - We wanted this to happen, and haven't yet ruled it out; but we haven't come up with a graceful way to do that that doesn't carry risks of breaking other things. We've been concentrating on improving the patcher, making it more stable and improving its performance. We'll keep trying though.

Ishu - Skippy hi there. when are the lvl caps gonna be raised?

Manga - We are focused on improving the current content and alternate character advancement for our current level cap first and foremost before we begin exploring raising the current level cap. The biggest thing we are working on in that regard is "The War" which will impact all our player base.

Ishu - Varangaard Lairs: What will be the smallest and largest lair size available?

DavidBowman - We have not finalized the depths of the lairs, that will be done as the last step of public testing. The current lairs range in area from 72x72 meters to 96x144. The default testing depth will be between 120 and 240 meters. The mode of area is 120x120

Ishu - C`gan What happens to all mask files sent from the close of this event's contest?

Amadan - We will be keeping all the mask submissions we get. If we have a future events or contests we might use them.

Ishu - Samael Client Issues: Any progress on the "Target is 1 meter out of range" error for dragons?

Smeglor - There is a general issue when one or both combatants has a large body which results in the unattractive graphical effect of character models intersecting in order to be in melee range. There is a solution planned that hasn't yet taken priority over more pressing issues and features.

Ishu - Ahura Fall Festival: Is trick or treating again on the Fall Festival Menu?

Amadan - Trick or Treating will be in the Fall Festival this year. There will also be other ways to get your hands on some candy.

Ishu - Samael Lairs: What Stats will be used for Lairshaping and Crystalshaping?

AmonGwareth - Crystalshaping uses three skills; dexterity, focus and power, with the bulk coming from Focus. Lairshaping uses four skills; dexterity, focus, power and strength, with the bulk coming from power and strength.

Ishu - Varangaard Client: There was once talk of improving/rewriting the client resource manager. Any progress, or still on pony list?

DavidBowman - As part of creating a new client for present/future products, there will be an entirely different method of resource managing. For this client, integrating the rewritten resource manager was too complex and so was shelved until we could restructure other parts of the client. It will be reapproached after we address those issues.

Ishu - gopher{stillsick} Will you be using more "player made content" in ways other than contests? Like will we ever be able to submit our own textures for mobs, or new static models (like trees)?

Amadan - We do have plans for player created content such as monster skinning, designing a monster and quest creation. We have plenty of things to keep players busy with the upcoming months. The response we received with the ghost stories and masks were overwhelming. We want to thank the players for their submissions.

Ishu - Murmandamus Lairs again: When can we get an updated list of Lair coordinates as were posted in the Community forums some time ago?

DavidBowman - Illy has requested a complete coordinate list for testing for next week... so, I'll happily post it in the forums when I do that.

Ishu - Varangaard Fall harvest: For next year's event, would it be possible to get a reworked biped mask? Creating a mask for the current one was somewhat problematic. (these problems were discussed in the community forum's mask thread)

Amadan - Future mask contest are being considered and we will be working with the artists to see if we can get a different template in place.

Ishu - Kamo When the 'base price' will be valued as to volume, what's an estimate for a medium sized lair? Several hundred silver? Several Gold?

DavidBowman - The price the empire will buy and sell Lairs for will be set so that it is approximately the same as a plot in the community, unless the lair is significantly larger proportionately to other lairs. The reason they haven't yet been set is that we are still evaluating the value of a lair in relation to its volume.

Ishu - Arcat Lairs: Can lair plots be 'locked' aswell? (aka red barrier) - if so please move the one at the infamous harro shortcut a little east please :)

Smeglor - Lair plots will have all the same permission options as surface plots. The value of the infamous "red barrier" is currently under discussion, as its original intention of protecting the contents of a plot has been superceded by proper permission checks for storage and trade with NPCs.

DavidBowman - Let me add that the red barrier for a plot would go down, not up. for a lair The volume of a plot is from the surface, upward. The volume of a Lair is from the entrance, downward.

Ishu - C`gan What are these big stone disks above lairs?

DavidBowman - Lairs have stone caps at the end of the entrance... at least it is supposed to be at the end of the entrance. On some plots, due to an error on my part, the lair data is confused about which community to which it belongs. This has been corrected internally.

Ishu - Krakoa Has any thought been give to those players that already have biped plots with inventory stored on them. The way it is set up now, we will have to sell the plot before we can buy a lair, which means we will need a place to store the inventory from the biped plot until the lair is built. Would it be possible to allow a temporary time period where we can own 2 plots?

Smeglor - Unfortunately that is a technical impossibility. If you don't feel you can trust someone to sell your existing plot to while you transfer the items, you could consider adding a second subscription for one month while you make the move.

Ishu - Kamo For those lairs that can only be reached via flight, is there any thought of putting in a way for adult dragons to carry hatchlings or bipeds up to the entrance if they so choose?

DavidBowman - One of the features of some Lairs is that they can only be approached through the air. If you don't like that feature of that Lair, please don't buy that Lair, it isn't what you want. We aren't able to provide dragon carrying yet, it's firmly on the pony list, and will come off as soon as core issues have all been addressed.

Ishu - Samael Will Amadan be going to typing class :P

DavidBowman - He's going to study from Manga-sensei... the art of one finger typing.

Amadan - Im nto sre I undersnd waht yrour tlkng abut. On a serious note. Lack of sleep and trying to cut back on soda is a very bad thing :(

DavidBowman - Just like plots, that don't have restrictions on the tier of the structures that can be built on them, Lairs will not prevent chambers or corridors from being built on them through a tier restriction. Size will still matter though, as some of the larger chambers won't fit within all Lair volumes.

DavidBowman - Thank you all for coming and asking questions. We appreciate your interest and your playing of Horizons.

Amadan - Thank you for coming. :)

DavidBowman - which was an answer for: Krakoa Will lairs be set up like plots, where there are different Tier levels, allowing beginner, J'man and expert shops?