House of Commons from 1999-02-25

House of Commons from 1999-02-25

Den_Dragon	Greetings and thank you for attending tonight's Open House.
Den_Dragon	Tonight's topic is: 'Evil and You'. Please phrase your questions accordingly.
Den_Dragon	Glamdring will be our moderator for this evening. In order to submit questions please /msg or /query Troll, Jerrith, Kazola, Hellbunny.
Den_Dragon	Please /msg different question-takers at different times, in order to balance the load and speed this process up. Do not msg anyone from Origin, myself or Glamdring--these questions will be ignored.
Den_Dragon	Remember that the DevTeam may not have the opportunity to answer all of your questions. In addition, some questions may not be answered if the DevTeam feels that it is not appropriate or that it has been better answered through some other question.
Den_Dragon	In addition, please do not submit any questions that have already been answered during past conferences. We encourage you to read the logs of the previous Open Houses, which are available at http://uohoc.stratics.com.
Den_Dragon	Thanks for coming, everyone. We will now begin accepting questions.
Glamdring	*^Asp-LoD* Would it be possible to have dungeons free of murder counts and free looting since they are supposed to be very evil places.
DesignerD	No, that is not likely to happen. Dungeons provide a significant amount of the treasure (and enjoyment!) in the game, and we don't want them limited to only those who are experts at PvP.
Glamdring	*Marduk* You have mentioned many prospective benefits to declaring yourself evil, could you perhaps list some of these "benefits" so we know what it is we are going to see soon?
DesignerD	Well, we've actually got two different ways we're thinking of evil. SO bear in mind that what I am telling you is still somewhat up in the air... but basically:
DesignerD	if you join evil factions, you could take over cities, make the shopkeepers all into undead or the like as you conquer the city & replace the shopkeepers with evil beings, etc. That woul dbe part of the faction warfare stuff.
DesignerD	For solo evil things, one thing we have thought about is if you kill enough slayers-of-evil (we're calling them paladins right now) you could acquire special powers as you rise in the favor of your dark lord.
Glamdring	*Seajei* If you declare yourself evil, can you still have a bounty posted on you? If I were to PK, it would be to get the highest bounty in the game, not for the loot
DesignerD	Hmm... yes,a bounty could be posted on you, I suppose.
Glamdring	*Bishop_Ebonhand* greetings.. my question concerns assasins and the disguise kit.. I would like to know if there will be provisions for assasins to gain access to the disguise kit without becoming thieves?
DesignerD	Well, we'd have to actually have solid plans for assassins first. And we don't yet. :)
DesignerD	But once we do, then yes, that woul dbe something we'd keep in mind, for sure. :)
Glamdring	*Rosie* Will the upcoming necromancy system be limited to "evil" characters, or somehow influence a character towards "evil"? This seems like a more realistic approach than allowing everyone to cast these spells.
DesignerD	At the moment, it doesn't necessarily tilt people towards evil. Then again, it's not done. ;)
Glamdring	*Ensign* I think like the upcoming Evil Pker patch. Just one Question: if a Red (Evil) Pkiller kills a character, what will happen to the things the deceased had with him. Will they ALL remain on his ghost? If not, what will keep a dishonorable Pkiller from staying near the body and killing the newly ressed player over and over, while the things on his body decay?
DesignerD	The items would stay with the ghost, except in the case of paladins, whose stuff would stay behind (that's the price you pay for being anoted killer of evil scum)
Glamdring	*Milch* Will Necromancy work together with Magery as Stealth does with Hiding? In this case a Necromancer is a powerful regular mage who also deals with the dead? (not a common specification for Necromancy, which is often a separated school of magic). Finally, will Spirit Speak and Forensic Evaluation play a significant role in Pagan Magic? This will leave us pure mages (alchemy / inscription / magery / resist / medita
DesignerD	It's quite likely we will just replace Spirit Speak with necromancy. It's essentially a separate school of magic.
DesignerD	It may be tied to magery in some aspects though.
Glamdring	*BloodSport* How will NPC's deal with people who are evil but not red? and will necro's be treated diff in towns then say pks?
DesignerD	There won't be any such thing as evil and not red. :) We're not looking at actually having ncreomancers go red as a result of what they do.
Glamdring	*El_Barto* With this new rogue system, and the hindering of thieves being able to make a murder count against someone, many thieves will become victims of other players quite often, which is a real turn off, and it'll turn many people away from being thieves. Is there any chance of having to ID a person as being a thief first? It's quite obvious who is a thief and who isn't by their notoriety, but having to ID them firs
DesignerD	In a nutshell: we WANT many people to turn away from being thieves.
Glamdring	*Mithrandir* What form of spells can we expect to see from Necromancy? Many players have been wondering what spells to expect.
DesignerD	Animate dead for sure. :) Kind of a key component of necromancy. But basically, we actually want player sto discover the spells themselves. So for example, we're not going to tell you HOW to cast animate dead. You'll have to figure it out.
Glamdring	*C-Kang* If the evil button goes in, will it make you attackable to anyone? It would be bad enough that we'd not be able to loot, but being attackable all the time would be fairly ruinous. Also, could we venture inside of towns?
DesignerD	Yes, you can venture inside of towns safely, but yes, you will be attackable outside of town.
Glamdring	*Cyrae* I read recently that an intended feature to be implimented will allow evil characters to conquer cities. Is this still planned? I assume that this will allow those who are red to participate as well, so will some type of method be added that will allow either the killing or otherwise dispelling of the guards?... Anything else you can tell us?
DesignerD	Conquering cities won't be done by literally conquering them. The battles will take place outside towns, for example, so guards won't be a factor. Also, keep in mind that not only evil will be able to conquer towns... we'r elooking at having a range of factions, some good, some evil.
Glamdring	*Ringleader* Why is it that you currently really can't be a brigand without being a murderer, and your "blue Pk plan" makes it so murderer's can't also be brigands? Wouldn't a surrender system where you forfeit your goods for invulnerability (temporary) solve both problems?
DesignerD	No system which relies on "temporary invulnerability" is likely to work very well, that's just a tough thing to implement. Keep in mind: you can STILL be a murderer in the traditional way! So you can still be a brigand and threaten death.
Glamdring	*Onyx* If I choose to go evil and then decide that it is not for me, what ways would I go about becoming blue again?
DesignerD	We don't have any plans for converting back at the moment. We're worried about exploitation on that front.
DesignerD	I'd advise you go evil with newbies, honestly.
Glamdring	*Ikari* How come the "good-guys" are not getting any special powers and such for doing good deeds?
DesignerD	Who said they aren't? :)
DesignerD	That's what "paladins" are for.
Glamdring	*Primis_* is there any way to protect your house from someone who is in stealth mode, to prevent them from breaking in?
DesignerD	Use detect hidden tomorrow. It will automatically reveal everyone in your house, without affecting your skill level.
Glamdring	*Crazy_Ed* There has been some talk on the playable race message boards about a vampirism disease spread through UO only Very difficultly by monsters, or as a special gift from seers. What are the chances of getting Vampirism?
DesignerD	Would you settle for lycanthropy?
Glamdring	*GoldDust-NV* About being evil. If I am evil, and a blue player initiates combat against me and I come out victorious. Will I be able to loot him, seeing as he chose to start teh fight?
DesignerD	Nope.
Glamdring	*KuokoOfBon* I like the special powers and paladins, but are the plans to limit this to only pvper's instead of perhaps somebody that likes to hunt evil mages, for instance?
DesignerD	Afraid so, at least at the moment. We're looking at all of this in the context of managing the pvp and pk population, you see.
Glamdring	*Mallick* If I wanted to combat evil and become a paladin what would I have to do? Is it simply a case of attacking evil characters, or will a paladin have special bonuses?
DesignerD	Hunt down evil people and kill them. Do it often and well, and don't die, and you might become a paladin.
Glamdring	*DrTwisTer* Two part question. With the recent proposals for evil/good and opening up the possibilities of roleplaying, where does roleplaying a Pirate come into play, specifically dealing with looting. Pirate want loot, and the current proposal has no loot. Also, SunSword, what is being arranged for expanded PvP and boats, again focusing around evil pirates at Bucs Den.
SunSword	Essentially, the current plans for factions of good and evil don't take into account a system for "looting" style roleplaying. That's because the focus is on PvP combat (at the moment, it's expandable)
SunSword	As for PvP and boats..
SunSword	We have made several advances in the area of boats, but our first goal is to make them more managable and reliable, after that, we hope to add many more features to make boats interesting
SunSword	Including making the seas a more interesting place...
DesignerD	(like deep sea fishing, which I am doing right now) :)
SunSword	But I don't have details for you on ship-to-ship combat
SunSword	(and NPC pirates, and random spawning islands with monsters and loot, etc...)
Glamdring	*Seajei* any plans for making it easier to hunt Reds/Evil? Like making colors appear on tracking or being able to track recall/gates?
DesignerD	No plan for enhanced tracking with it... we have discussed being able to recall off of the sparklies left behind by recall many times... but we're not looking at anything specific like that as part of the PvP plans.
Glamdring	*Galen[LS]* any chance of taking out fame loss for Paladins and Evils during "paladin vs evil" combat?
DesignerD	No plans for doing that, thoug hI can easily see giving no fame loss to people killed by evils.
Glamdring	*Fate_Drach* would there be a new colour for evil? or would it be red?
DesignerD	It would be red. We want to keep the colors simple: red means "watch out, this guy probably wants to kill you."
Glamdring	*Joshua_Rowan* To become a Paladin I just have to kill lots of Evil players? But isn't that exploitable by the fact that I could just kill my friend's Newbie Evil character over and over and over again until I'm a Paladin?
DesignerD	If you're killing evils with no standing themselves, you aren't going to get anywhere. If you have seen the scoring system on the Abyss, you know how this works... you only gain "points" for killing thos ewho have themselves actually acquired some standing. In the scenario you describe, that newbie evil guy would become worthless to you after just a couple of kills.
Glamdring	*SmokinJoe* Considering the lack of land there is to build houses etc. What are the chances of implimenting newer larger ships such as the one found that's docked at Delucia? This would also be a good chance to implement pirate type wars etc. Any chance?
DesignerD	No plans for larger ships at this time. Basically, we're not going to be doing anything with boats in the short term except FIXING them.
Glamdring	*ghyde* Would it be possible for evil role-playing characters to explore the non-human aspect of the game, such as trading and hanging out with monesters? * DD claps a hand over his mouth and refuses to spill any beans.
Glamdring	*Ensign* DD, you just said that if a blue player attacks a red player and dies, he will not be able to get looted. Don't you expect massive attacks on red players since the attackers will have nothing to lose? Or will Red Players that died by a non-Paladin be unlootable as well?
DesignerD	Yes, we expect massive attacks on reds. :) But paladins WILL have something to lose. Dying will cost them their paladin status. And any special powers that go with the title.
Glamdring	*Mallick* Will evils suffer stat loss on death, or just a fame loss?
DesignerD	Evil means no stat loss (since you do not take murder counts). Unless you acquired murder counts & stat loss before you went evil, of course.
Glamdring	*Townkill^Jim* 2 part question, first what are plans for "blue healers" and second, what is going to be addressed with Mana vamp and mana drain this is way overpowered, my character has 88 resist and is 0 for 8 against mana vamp
DesignerD	Blue healers will not stay blue. :) Expect something related to this as part of the blue PK update.
DesignerD	As far as mana drain and mana vamp, a miniupdate is in testing right now that addresses this, and you should expect it on all the shards tomorrow.
Glamdring	*Mithrandir* Seeing that Necromancers cannot loot, essentially what is the point for a normal player to be evil? After awhile it'd loose it's fad, not all of OSI's players are rpg's.
DesignerD	Who said that necromancers cannot loot? Necromancer != going evil. As far as the incentive for a normal player to be evil: the special powers, of course.
DesignerD	As far as it being a fad, we doubt it. :) There are going to be MANY ways to engage in PvP in UO. 1) being a red murderer who can loot & takes stat loss 2) being evil 3) guild warfare 4) faction warfare (like Order/Chaos only better)
DesignerD	The kind of PvP that is going away is rampant blue PKing.
DesignerD	Oh--for those not up on C syntax, != means "not equal to"
DesignerD	sorry about that :P
Glamdring	*Pander* Is being a paladin considered in a guild?
DesignerD	No.
Glamdring	*Airc* I think it would be nice if monsters/animals acted different to different characters. Some would be more aggressive to evil/good independantly, and weaker monsters/animals would run from experienced players. Any thoughts?
DesignerD	Sure does sound nice. We'd like to get to adding more AI to creatures sometime in the next few months.
Glamdring	*Galen[LS]* what sort of powers can we expect paladins and evils to have (just an example plz) * DD bites his tongue.
DesignerD	Wait and see.
Glamdring	*Dr_Adam[GL]* with all this new Evil/Good stuff will u ever be able to declare "Allies" on a guild stone?
Glamdring
DesignerD	post it
Glamdring	blah
DesignerD	Factions will kind of be a way to do that. Eventually a full ally system is something we'd like for guilds, but there's a lot of cleanup work we'd like to do on guildstones before we get to that
Glamdring	*Salarn* Will Murder Counts Be Reset When The New System Is Added
DesignerD	I doubt it.
Glamdring
Taran	Will evil lumberjacks be able to carve logs into boards?
DesignerD	Into evil boards, no less! Yes, yu will be able to carve boards in the next update.
Glamdring	*Draconius* Can we gain Paladin status by killing evil creatures?
DesignerD	Probably not.
Glamdring	*Dr_Adam[GL]* With Evil boards will that be different then the weight of Paladin Logs?
DesignerD	Only in that the soul of paladin boards is lighter. :)
Glamdring	I would like to thank everyone for coming. This concludes our chat for tonight
Glamdring	We will be taking a field trip to an evil petting zoo soon
Hellbunny	woo
Glamdring	Thanks to DD, SunSword and Dupre for coming
Dr_Evil	G'night all
DesignerD	Good night all...!