Lycans are out!

Moirean

Yay!

ANNOUNCE NEWS #2247

Date: 4/13/2014 at 3:40

From: Oleis, the Infused

To  : Everyone

Subj: Lycan Revamp

Madness has overtaken the werewolves and werebears of Sapience, stirring up bloodthirst and chaos among the packs. With help from the mysterious werecrocs and wereboars, the Shapeshifters have entered a new era. The Atabahi and Bahkatu are no more. Representatives from each Shapeshifter faction have come together at a special gathering place for the Packmoot to discuss their future and begrudgingly recruit new shifters to their

ranks.

At long last, the Lycan revamp is complete. Now any Aetolian character may become a Shapeshifter, completely separate from the multiclass system. And best of all, you don't necessarily need to spend a single lesson to get involved. Existing Lycans have been extended a full refund for their skills, should they choose to FORGET them or quit class. By extension, anyone in the Atabahi or Bahkatu has been granted full class status, regardless of prior guild rank. As explained in the next Announce post, your primary class skills will contribute lessons toward

Shapeshifter skills.

We've made a few tweaks to accomodate the new Shapeshifter types. The Lycanthropy skill has been renamed to Shapeshifting. The Howling/Roaring skill has been renamed to Vocalizing. Ferality remains unchanged.

Talk to the representative werewolf, werebear, werecroc or wereboar in their offices at the Packmoot den to secure the Shapeshifter subclass and feel free to message me with any questions.

 

Penned by my hand on the 25th of Chakros, in the year 417 MA.

ANNOUNCE NEWS #2248

Date: 4/13/2014 at 3:40

From: Oleis, the Infused

To  : Everyone

Subj: Lycan Revamp Changelog

Shapeshifting changelog

-----------------------

- 'Lycan' is no longer a traditional class one learns. It is a separate concept, outside the multiclassing system, earned by quest completion. Up to 66% of your primary class skills will credit toward your Shapeshifter skills. That means that a Teradrim Fabled in Terramancy will be roughly Fabled in Ferality when mutated. A tri-trans Teradrim will only be slightly above Fabled in the Shapeshifter skills, though. You'll need to spend the usual number of lessons to tri-trans the class, but this initial boost makes sure that everyone can get involved.

- MUTATE will bring you into your Shapeshifter form (werewolf, werebear, wereboar, werecroc).

 - REVERT will bring you back to your regular form.

- Mutation time no longer scales with skill level in Shapeshifting (Lycanthropy).

- For 60 seconds after each mutation or reversion, Shapeshifters will experience mutation sickness, a significant debuff meant to discourage excessive shifting.

- Retract and Elongate have been removed. The 10% balance bonus from retract is now inherent.

- Pawguard has been removed. Shapeshifters may now use the PARRY command instead.

- Thickfur has been renamed to Bodyheat. The effect is now a persistent defence which can block one freezing attempt every 20 seconds.

- Thickhide now provides 10% magic damage resistance in addition to its previous effects. Magic damage resistance has therefore been removed from Bracing.

- Removed "Language" from the Shapeshifting abilities. Shapeshifters will be able to speak freely and intelligibly in their mutated forms.

- Mutation status has been added to gmcp.Char.Vitals so that systems may properly detect which Wereform you're using.

 

Madness

-------

- New mechanic: Madness. Every mutated Shapeshifter will slowly accumulate Madness. (5% every 25 minutes at base level). Madness accrual will be increased by the presence of other Shapeshifters in your room. As madness increases, you'll notice the following effects:

+ Damage to you will increase proportional to your madness. Damage from Ferality attacks will be boosted an additional amount.

+ Above 70% madness, you will be unable to revert to your regular form.

+ At 100% madness, you will fly into an animalistic rage, attacking any player in sight. At this point, only killing another player or dying will slake your bloodlust.

    

Madness slowly recedes while you're not mutated. The following things also reduce Madness:

    + Eating carrion (slight reduction)

    + Killing mobiles (slight reduction)

    + Killing players (significant reduction)

    + Dying (complete removal)

    

Madness is sent as part of gmcp.Char.Vitals and is available as a regular prompt option or custom prompt token. (@madness, color is ^L)

 

Ferality

--------

  - Claw has been removed. It was quite redundant with Slash.

- Slash's syntax is now SLASH <target> [bodypart]. Bodypart remains optional.

  - JUGULARCLAW has been renamed to JUGULAR.

  - THROATCLAW has been renamed to THROATSLICE.

  - DESTROYARM/DESTROYLEG have been merged into DESTROY.

  - Similarly, MANGLEARM and MANGLELEG have been merged into MANGLE.

- SKULLCRUSHER has been renamed to SKULLCRUSH. While the requirements remain the same, the attack no longer has a distinct damage result for each of the two possible activation criteria. Instead, it will behave somewhere in the middle regardless of whether the target is unconscious or proned with a concussion. Because this represents one of the only serious combat balancing changes in this revamp, numbers are subject to change after observation.

  - FLURRY's messages have been condensed.

  

Vocalizing

----------

- The "inflating" howl has been removed. "Distasteful" will now deliver belonephobia to undead players while causing anorexia in living players.

- New Croc-only shriek: Muddling. Delivers the magic_impaired affliction.

  - New Boar-only squeal: Hypnotic. Delivers the hypersomnia affliction.

- Conversion to combat Messages complete. Between that and my obssessive need to correct ancient grammatical errors, essentially every howl message has changed in some way.

 

Penned by my hand on the 25th of Chakros, in the year 417 MA.

Moirean

So! Questions:

- Can we form packs that are split between types? I really kinda wanna be a sunbear, but like 80% of the people are gonna be wolves and I don't want to be alone.

- Will there be other options in the future? Were kitty cats of some sort??

- How easy will it be to switch types? Will it cost a ton of lessons?

- How will madness work with PK rules?

Razmael

Moirean said:

So! Questions:

- Can we form packs that are split between types? I really kinda wanna be a sunbear, but like 80% of the people are gonna be wolves and I don't want to be alone.

- Will there be other options in the future? Were kitty cats of some sort??

- How easy will it be to switch types? Will it cost a ton of lessons?

- How will madness work with PK rules?

1) No pack splitting.

2) Maybe

3) Right now it's super easy. You should just be able to quit the lycan class (the skills are 100% refunded for now, while people get used to it), and talk to the mob of the type you want. In the future, after things settle down, there will be an initiation quest you need to do with each faction type.

4) No change to PK rules.

Moirean

Any chance the splitting thing may be reconsidered in the future?

Raeche

I feel bad for Mr. Norrad. No one seems to want to buy bear

A deep den hung with bones (54248) - the Shamtota Hills (98)

An axe slung over his shoulder, Norrad watches the area.

You see a single exit leading west.

Moirean

I want bear, but all the Carnis want wolf.

OR WERE PANTHER MROOWWW PURRRRR PURRRR

Mariena

In the event it sounded like having a pack would decrease the madness levels.

In the post, it said being around other mutated creatures would INCREASE the madness levels. 

But it doesn't say anything about being in a pack?

Razmael

When the new pack system is properly released, this will be true.

Jensen

Up to 66% of your primary class skills will credit toward your Shapeshifter skills.

doesnt that mean we should quit class and get it again for reduced lesson cost?

Haern

Moirean said:

Any chance the splitting thing may be reconsidered in the future?

That'd be extremely far down the road even to come up as a consideration. There's a lot going on with the various types and the workings of packs that'll be unveiled in the coming days.

Jensen

@moirean I'm bear, I'm considering dropping it or changing since none of my friends are bear

Razmael

Jensen said:

Up to 66% of your primary class skills will credit toward your Shapeshifter skills.

doesnt that mean we should quit class and get it again for reduced lesson cost?

The way that works is a little tricky to explain.

Your class skills have 60000 points. 60000 is equivalent to Trans. The class that you MUTATE from will carry over up to 40k of those 60k possible points from the primary and secondary skills and invest them into Ferality and Shapeshifting respectively.

This will NEVER get you to Transcendent in your Shapeshifter skills unless you have invested the full ~1736 lessons you usually need to get to Transcendent. Your lesson investment in the Shapeshifter class skills will be scaled down to fit the difference between 60000 and the carried over points.

Here's a verbose mathematical example:
I had 25000 points carried over into Ferality from my previous class. The difference between 60000 and 25000 is 35000.
I had 30000 points already invested into Ferality. 30000 is 50% of 60000.
My final points in Ferality will be 25000 + 50% of 35000, for a total of 42500.

Roux

Soooo, you can't scent or use heatsight outside of lycan class now? Or any of the defs. That's kind of a bummer, especially if you have no other classes.
- You also can't learn unless physically mutated, and then, MADNESS

Xiuhcoatl

I'm just bummed that all the money/credits went into the city instead of being distributed amount the ex-guild members VIA the guild leader. 

Now Moirean is going to be snorting blow out of a. Well, you know how the saying goes.

Edit: I just realized wereboars squeal. Now all I'm going to be thinking about when fighting a wereboar is that one scene from deliverance >.>

Razmael

Roux said:

Soooo, you can't scent or use heatsight outside of lycan class now? Or any of the defs. That's kind of a bummer, especially if you have no other classes.
- You also can't learn unless physically mutated, and then, MADNESS

Not sure if I understand your point? You couldn't use heatsight/scent outside of lycan class before either - unless you had the racial skill unlocks which still applies.

While the learning is a concern, it'd take over 5 hours of being in Shapeshifter class to get to the 70% threshold and should be manageable for now. I have it on my list to make it so you can learn any class skill you hold without being in the class.

Roux

You can't keep lycan your active class. There's no option to just be lycan all the time, you only gain access to those skills when mutated. Thus, people with no other classes are literally classless without being mutated. No defs, no skills.

Saybre

Whole Madness thing..everytime, keep thinking this..

Razmael

Roux said:

You can't keep lycan your active class. There's no option to just be lycan all the time, you only gain access to those skills when mutated. Thus, people with no other classes are literally classless without being mutated. No defs, no skills.

So long as you're not just spending all your time idling, you can stay mutated for as long as you desire. The only difference now is that once every five hours you'll need to go kill/eat some mobs to reduce your madness

Xavin

Razmael said:

Moirean said:

So! Questions:

- Can we form packs that are split between types? I really kinda wanna be a sunbear, but like 80% of the people are gonna be wolves and I don't want to be alone.

- Will there be other options in the future? Were kitty cats of some sort??

- How easy will it be to switch types? Will it cost a ton of lessons?

- How will madness work with PK rules?

1) No pack splitting.

2) Maybe

3) Right now it's super easy. You should just be able to quit the lycan class (the skills are 100% refunded for now, while people get used to it), and talk to the mob of the type you want. In the future, after things settle down, there will be an initiation quest you need to do with each faction type.

4) No change to PK rules.

Over liaisons I asked if moving forward quitting shapeshifter will be any more difficult than quitting a normal class and the answer was no, it's going to stay like a normal class rather than being all questy. So! Even if you have doubts that it might not be your thing, give it a try!

Setne

If only non-class defenses stayed on switch.

Razmael

Setne said:

If only non-class defenses stayed on switch.

You'll be happy to know that is already coded in as part of the upcoming liaison changes!

Setne

This bear is happy.

Aarbrok

I am one of....

Aarbrok

@Oleis or @Razmael

Simple flavor messages such as pelts/hides etcetera, showing as FUR in werecroc room descriptions

Nalor

Is the packmoot den a new area or something? As the 5 people I've asked, no one knows

Razmael

Aarbrok said:

@Oleis or @Razmael

Simple flavor messages such as pelts/hides etcetera, showing as FUR in werecroc room descriptions

The croc room desc should now properly say scales instead of fur.

Nalor said:

Is the packmoot den a new area or something? As the 5 people I've asked, no one knows

Yes, it can be found in the Shamtota.

Ezrax

Werechickens.

Nalor

Thanks @Razmael .. Are we getting an HELP File on this?

Ezrax

We're getting A help file, possibly.

Calipso

So many announces!


Also who thought up wereboars? XD Such a funny concept. I'd have thought lions or snakes as the fourth possible one.

Daskalos

Is there a cooldown timer on mutation? As in, could I be Luminary all the time, mutate into Lycanthrope, wreck some people with class skills at a leyline, then swap back to Luminary and unmutate as soon as it's over?