Older updates

December 2023

• Level cap raised to 10
• Loot tables
  • data imported from EQOA Prima's Official Strategy Guide, excel table provided by Alutra
  • A separate list for each biome: Swamp, Plains, Wetlands, Rathe Mountains, Marine, Mountain, Red Desert, Wastelands, Forest, Desert, Arctic, Deep Jungle
  • A bit over 3000 items total
  • Four drop rates: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Ultra Rare
  • Loot is based on the biome of the NPC's spawn position, Tunaria only, quad-zones as defined by Alutra, seen also on the map if zoomed enough
  • All NPC's should now have the Generic table in addition to the biome based table
  • Items with level requiment more than 1 above your current level shouldn't drop (anymore)
  • Drop rates are now quite high for testing purposes: Common 40%, Uncommon 10%, Rare 1%, Ultra Rare 0.1%
• Currently level/race/class restrictions of equippable items aren't enforced, to allow testing. For this reason, some equipped items may appear unequipped (no green background) in inventory
• Item stats shown in Character menu
• Damage formula provided by Imtkain here
  • Level diff capped to give more reasonable values for testing
  • Weapon level (probably means the level required to use?) in the formula is set to the player's level if they're too low
• Stats used in the above formula should now be calculated from the character's base stats and equipment
• Character's base stamina and equipment additions affect maximum HP as explained here
• Portal Master has a quest, mainly to test the interaction editor, awards an Ultra-rare item (no level consideration for now)
• Started on a pet system; as revealed in the quest, saying "hep" will spawn a pet that can tank or heal
• Sandstorm Control Panel has an editor for item lists (loot tables, quest loots, maybe merchants), not very easy to use at the moment but was used to place quest drops
• Sandstorm Control Panel also has an interaction editor that can produce interactions from simple oneliners to quests. Missing things, but it was used for the current quests
• Started Lua scripting system compatible with Project Return Home but had to remove it because license issues prevented Sandstorm using their scripts. Freeport starter quests (by Alutra) now partially implemented with the SCP Interaction editor
• Some quest item drops added to enable the Freeport quests, working to some extent. Quest item rewards not yet written in
• Quest states aren't currently saved to database so you can complete quests again after re-login
• New player's world greetings from Alutra's excel, shown every login now for testing, partially imported

Under construction & consideration

Some item handling bugs were fixed but apparently you may still get a "problem happened while equipping" error. Logging out and in resolves this. I've seen it in server logs but haven't been able to reproduce it lately. If you can find a consistent way of producing the error, please let me know. It happens when the server and client have a different idea about the items or their order in the inventory, i.e. somehow get their inventories in desync.

Attack speed is now about the same for everyone and every weapon except a bit faster for pets. What should it be? According to this, perhaps just a hard-coded value based on chacter type.

Bows and thrown weapons not implemented. No idea yet as to fire rate, range, damage, possibly required protocol details, etc. Haven't even checked if any documentation exists.

Loot tables - items were matched by names listed in the Prima guide. Not all items were found in the current database and some possibly had several matches. In these cases the item hasn't been added to loot tables.

The loot tables don't have below-Common junk (did such exist in the game? I have no memory). The current item database seems to contain over 4000 items that aren't on any of the loot tables.

Some items seem to have zero max HP (are eternally broken) in the items database? Some don't have any model ID defined so they aren't visible when equipped.

Spells/abilities - no updates since the first batch sent by Imtkain (I think), I should probably start working on that some time.

NPC stats, HP's, AC's, etc. are currently pretty random. For many of them I use level-based formula I saw somewhere: 0.087 * L² + 2.403 * L + 81.363 with a guesstimated multiplier. XP granted from a mob comes from a similar formula.

19 December 2023

A couple of things

• A quick and simple weather system. The EQOA client can display three intensities of either rain or snow. They can now start with a low probablilty anywhere, based on the biome, except Desert or Marine zone-quads (because rain in desert is unusual and marine can be arctic or not, nobody goes there, and it would require extra steps to determine if a marine zone is arctic or not, i.e. should it rain or snow).

  With a low probability the weather of a location can intensify, with a bit higher probability it can calm down a step. Weather can spread out to neighbouring zones (also Desert or Marine) to smooth out weather differences between zone borders. Not sure if works.

• Rhaanu who has worked with Imtkain etc. emailed me a sheet containing abilities/spells. I imported that but for now it's mainly the appearance; the actual effects mostly aren't coded yet.
• In the Portal Master quest, bat wing probably didn't drop due to an oversight, maybe fixed
• Why don't I get epic loots anymore? Because the level restriction. The loot tables from Prima Guide seem to have only about 70 items usable on level 10 and about 20 on level 5, so there isn't much variance.

20 December 2023

• Robes may be visible now. Fixed some other bugs in how gear is displayed
• Some robes are probably wrong in the item database, getting equipped in the belt slot or unequippable
• Major rework of the spells system underway, they may work inconsistently or not at all

22 December 2023

• abilities can be memorized
• preliminary implementation of some types of abilities continued, mainly
  • heal/damage
  • stats change, DoT, HoT
  • alter appearance
  • summon pet (all behave the same but may have different stats)
  • create item basically done but didn't find correct data about the items, so disabled for now
  • appropriate spell effects should be scaled according to stats, but not yet level-scaled
  • most types of abilities yet unimplemented
  • abilities that target the group only affect yourself
• Not tested much, a lot of things are likely broken and numbers weird, partially because people have high-level gear on levels <= 10
• Buffs/debuffs visible
• etc

4 January 2024

• Level cap raised to 20
• Fixed some bugs (and probably made some new). "Problem happened while equipping" hasn't appeared in server logs after some fixes about a week ago
• Figured out how to make bows work, required a couple of previously unknown UDP packet fields
• With that, had to rework basic combat timing to keep server and clients better in sync. It hopefully works more logically now, taking in account the autoattack option.
• Only simple bows tested so far on ranger, crossbows might not work yet
• Get arrows from the grocer at Darvar Manor
• Mostly for fun, made quick .ESF to JavaScript exporter. The owl and snowman you may see here and the main page were made with that. Example scene (content warning: heavy, don't try on an old PC or mobile device). If I get around to making a web-based item editor, this could be used to display/select 3D models for weapons
• etc

5 January 2024

• 3D models of equippable items now shown in the Control Panel item data
• 200 item models extracted. Apparently 60 of them aren't used in the current Hagley-originated database.
• You can search models by keyword (currently keywords are the name of a random item using the model) or view the unused items
• Example model
• Item graphics can be rotated with mouse
• TODO: assign models to items to correct missing or erroneous model ID, or to newly created items
• Some items with special effects or materials probably don't render correctly since the .ESF file format hasn't been 100% figured out

6 January 2024

• Some new Control Panel features to edit the items database
• Added keywords to 3D item models
• Item database updates: erroneous models, colors, equip slots etc. corrected for about 900 items, mostly by Lardubedu
• etc

9 January 2024

• A lot (hundreds if not thousands?) of armor items had an empty model in the item database so they wouldn't appear on the character. Default model chosen for them
• A lot of equip slot, icon, etc. fixes from Lardubedu
• More item editing options in SCP
• Updated how target "ring" color changes, based on suggestion from Rhaanu
• SCP has a tool for creating and editing lists of roaming wildlife. Their spawn spots can be set by clicking on the map, making it relatively easy and quick to populate zones with them
• Roamers added for Freeport and around Halas, visible on the map in green
• Other fixes and internal reworkings so malfunctions aren't totally unexpected

11 January 2024

• Got a new version of item database from Wisbe, about 60 new items
• More item fixes. Found where the armor model/type is stored in Faxon's database format, so armor should look right now (but a lot of weapons are still missing 3D models)
• Placed some roaming NPC's to a lot of places around Tunaria, over 3000 mobs
  • Did this quickly with a map-based clicking tool so there might be some errors. E.g. you can't see from the map view if an NPC is underground. Clicking to add a roamer will place it on the ground
  • The roamers might be too sparse but these can be adjusted later
• A lot of loot tables added, built by Lardubedu
• Fixed some weapon animations. Normal bow, 1h and 2h crossbows now show different animation and should work with correct attack speed. Also spears, dual wielded weapons etc. show correct animation but probably only if your character's level and class allow those weapons. The game client has some of that logic built in and can't be easily overridden.
• etc

14 January 2024

• More item fixes. For example, many crossbows were apparently misclassified as normal bows in the item database
• Collecting online time statistics started around December 22 2023. Since then, the sum of online time of all players is about 2600 hours. During this time 121 accouts visited the game world
• Added the latest dialogue updates from Alutra. Currently slightly over 60% of all friendly NPC's seem to have some kind of dialogue
  • Some coachmen broken until next reboot. You can of course still use the teleport option on SCP
• Experimented with pushing new graphics via patch server. Jasper Darvar now has a custom-made shield
• SCP has the option to add tags (words) on item lists and NPC's. This may simplify loot generation. E.g. all wolves could have the "wolf" tag. They will automatically drop items in any item lists that have the "wolf" tag.
• etc

17 January 2024

• New quest system converting Alutra's Excel quest content to Sandstorm-compatible Java code
• With that, some Freeport Human Magician, Bard and Alchemist quests added
• Quest items, loot tables and an NPC (Crim Arikson) added to enable those
• Freeport Human Magician quest chain tested until Crim Arikson, but some of his quests not currently doable
• Freeport Human Bard and Alchemist starter quests probably work up to some point, not tested
• Reminder: quest states aren't saved at the moment (to simplify testing) so after logout all quest info is reset
• For the new quests, items won't be removed from inventory after completion, so you won't have to re-kill mobs in order to re-test a quest
• bug fixes
• etc

19 January 2024

• Melee/ranged damage calculations used a wrong number for weapon damage, fixed (thanks Wisbe for noticing)
• Vertical movement of other players a bit smoother in multiplayer situations
• Under the hood improvements
• etc

20 January 2024

• Item updates, e.g. Oggok starter quest items created by Lardubedu (quests not done yet). Eel quest drop was disabled for some reason, fixed.
• Some spell updates from Rhaanu, e.g. fixed water elemental sprites
• Quest state is now saved so you won't lose quest progress on logout
• For quest testing/development purposes you can reset your quest flags in SCP, the management tab, while character in game
• Excel-imported quests now shouldn't get deadlocked if quest item doesn't fit in inventory
• etc

22 January 2024

• Quest update from Alutra for Freeport human wiz awar sk rge nec mag enc cl bar alc, about 90 quests total converted from Excel format
• Some NPC's, items and loot tables added to support those
• The quests are mostly untested, some drops etc. may still be missing. All magician quests tested and seem to work.
• Quest items from Lardubedu for Grobb and Halas (quests still missing)
• Some roamers added
• Added a default maxhp and durability to equippable items that had zero, over 3000 items
• Over 2000 equippable items in the database had classuse = none, probably wrong, set them to usable by any class for now
• bug fixes etc

26 January 2024

• More item updates
• Non-Tunaria NPC spawning was broken for a few days due to some changes, fixed
• Some preliminary factions implementation. If you kill a mob that has a faction defined, you'll see messages about your faction reputation changes, unless disabled in options
• NPC's show the blue/white/red face icon based on your standing with the faction
• Players have an initial faction standing/reputation with some factions, no race/class differences yet
• There is a lack of data on factions so we basically have to set them manually one by one NPC (except cases where you can automate it based on NPC names etc) so it's far from complete
• Aggro based on factions enabled in a couple of zones: Jared's Blight and Bandit Hills currently (may change real-time if problems)
• Aggro radius max 20

30 January 2024

• Big NPC update from the Hagley team, thanks
  • Says Nukesonu, "took a few years to get this update out but all zones should now have a beta population."
  • Importing the new data is not straightforward as it re-uses a lot of ID numbers of already existing NPC's. On the other hand the Hagley database doesn't have the many recent updates done in the Sandstorm database. Some programmatical heuristics used to reconcile the databases but complications are possible.
  • Dispersing new wildlife groups under progress
• Faction definition for NPC's ongoing
• Faction-based aggro is now indicated on the map by colors (blue, white, red) to help spotting wrongful aggressions
• Spontaneous aggro won't happen if the path to reach the player is > 40 units (meters?) long. Eventually there should be a line-of-sight evaluation but meanwhile this might eliminate many through-the-wall aggros.
• Bankers
• Inventory arranging
• Big database backend change hopefully improving the speed of many operations but problems possible
• Some backend inventory handling changes, should solve problems but new ones possible
• Bugfixes, etc.

4 February 2024

• bugs possibly fixed:
  • Loot All malfunction if part of the items didn't fit in the inventory
  • Item arrange malfunction (items order usually still reverts after relogin, will fix that some time)
  • Deposited items could be lost if bank was full (fixed already on 30 Jan)
  • Some combat pathing and disappearance issues ensued from recent changes
  • The damage formula produces negative damage with certain "unrealistic" stats that people currently have
  • Pet max HP wasn't right
• Added some missing grouping functions
• etc

8 February 2024

• Group member name bars didn't show up after leaving your first group, fixed
• Range of some melee abilities was too small, fixed
• Attacking mobs now maintain facing towards the target while adjusting distance (mainly cosmetic)
• Quests created with the SCP interaction editor (e.g. Portal Master) now check inventory space before completing the quest so rewards shouldn't be lost
• If Skandalf and the cat bother you, talk to the latter and ask them to leave you alone. Talk again to accept their help
• Imported the abilities Google sheet recently updated by Rhaanu. The structure changed, rewrote some import code, so there may be problems. Not sure if there are other spell changes
• Under the hood changes with timing etc, complications possible
• etc

19 February 2024

• Big pathfinding update
  • Mob pathing in Tunaria & Oggok & Odus should work better now
  • Outside them, new pathfinding data not yet generated, so mobs, including pets, go through walls, ground and other obstacles
• etc

20 February 2024

• Generated pathfinding data (navmeshes) for the rest of the areas: Lavastorm, PoS, ZP, PoD

21 February 2024

• Level cap 25
• After death you get resurrected at a spiritmaster
• Characters' last bound positions haven't been previously stored in the database, so if you die and haven't interacted with a spiritmaster after this update, you'll be resurrected at your character's initial spawn point
• Some spell fixes; e.g. AoE ranges were wrong after the major Google Sheet update and some snare/root effects didn't work right
• etc

23 February 2024

• To reduce the weird effects from arbitry item levels, item stats are now scaled based on their required level and the player's level
  • Meaning stats are decreased if you use high-level gear
  • If this proves too painful for playtesting, I'll adjust or revert it soon
  • After level-up, gear stats will increase if they were under their intended minimum level. The increase isn't currently visible in the numbers you see in inventory until next login, but the new stats are still in effect
• It's possible to loot items that are up to 10 levels higher than your level of any level
• Some changes to SCP to discourage "abuse"
• Some combat/pet AI changes with positioning etc
• Tried to find an algorithm to fix the problem of some roamers spawning in trees
  • happened e.g. Fayspires
  • Some probably unrelated pathing problems remain at least in Permafrost - some mobs seem to find their way to an underground ice layer
• etc

25 February 2024

• kill XP changes
  • Using a new formula based on community knowledge
  • Only the group (or solo player) doing the most damage to a mob should get XP; previously everyone on the mob's aggro table got XP
  • Total XP for a kill is determined mostly by the level difference between the mob and the highest-level group member
  • Since killing high-level mobs is greatly easified, the level difference in calculations is capped to 3 (i.e. you get same XP for killing a +10 lv mob as +3)
  • Total XP shared to a group is more than for a solo kill, more bonus for bigger groups
  • XP is shared between members based on their level distribution, higher level = bigger share
  • If a group member's level is too low compared to the highest member, no XP to them
  • If mob level is too low compared to the highest member level, no XP to anyone
  • It's a bug-prone process, so for now you get a bit of debug info for group XP, hopefully making easier to track potential bugs
• Some alchemy progress
• etc

28 February 2024

• implemented some new spell effect types: defensive and offensive procs, lull (reduce aggro radius)
• SoW-type effects break when engaging in combat or casting spells (not sure what exactly should break it)
• new Portal Master quest with exclusive rewards by Lardubedu
• alchemist fixes
• some faction/aggro fixes
• group AoE graphic fixes
• prepare/toolbelt
• etc