EpicDuel PVP Game Design Notes

December 06, 2012

Now it can be told: the official release date for Omega is December 14th early February! Of course, we can't confirm what time exactly, but we will do our absolute best to get this epic release to you in a stable, tested condition! To satisfy your curiousity on some of Omega's amazing features, enjoy this new Design Notes as we continue the Omega marathon!

Changes to NPCs

Today we wanted to go over some changes to how NPC fights will work in Omega. We want NPCs to fill the purposes of:

                1) training or testing builds

                2) gaining credits

                3) furthering missions and the storyline

They currently fill some other purposes that we want to move away from, including padding battle records, faction farming, and leveling.

Some of the changes are as follows:

• NPC fights no longer count towards your battle record. We want the Leaderboards and your battle record to clearly reflect your PvP accomplishments instead of forcing players to farm NPCs to pad their win rates.
• You can now fight NPCs an unlimited number of times.
• NPCs will not give experience after level 5. This will allow new players to be eased into the battle system, but afterwards we want the focus to be on PvP. This also allows leveling players to get credits without continuing to level if they feel like they are falling behind.
• NPCs will no longer give Battle Tokens or Influence. Since you can fight them without limit, we don’t want factions or players to farm them for Tokens or Influence. Again, we want the focus here to be on PvP.
• NPCs will not give rewards if you lose. We don’t want people to purposely lose to NPCs over and over, so you will need to win to get Credits or other rewards.
• Brainwashing is removed since it is no longer necessary.

Enhancements

We know there are still many questions about what we’re doing with Enhancements, but we’re not quite ready to talk about this in-depth yet. We will say now that the new system will allow for much greater customization than before, and will involve equipping passive effects and active abilities to your weapons.

Additionally, we will be providing compensation for those that have enhanced weapons in the current system. We’ll provide more specifics soon.

Omega Obliteration! 

We would like to kick off our new development phase with not one, but TWO promotional packages. These designs were inspired by devoted EpicDuel player and aspiring artist TrizzzCentrino! You can choose from the Omega Obliteror set, which features an energy sword plus a mutating weapon! 

OR if physical damage is more your thing, you may select the Omega Onslaughter!

All of these weapons will offer 2 new weapon skills (one active, one passive) to give you an edge in Omega. We will explain what these skills are and what they do as soon as we finalize the details!

Speaking of promotions: Check out Heromart's Coming Soon page for details on the upcoming "Are You Yeti" shirt! This epic garment will come with not one, but TWO yetis for you to play with for the upcoming release!

The Frozen North

Alydriah has been up to no good in her captured territory. However, there is one bastion of hope in this shattered land:

Titan stands watch from his mountain lair in Frysteland. Many displaced Krampus have taken shelter at the foot of this mountain fortress, seeking some respite from constant harassment from Legion troops. Alydriah is smart enough to steer clear of this mysterious refuge, but not so fearful that she wouldn't taunt the gods of Delta V through more indirect means. What new cybernetic terrors has Alydriah created in during the Legion's occupation of this region? Would Alydriah burn Frysteland to the ground just to annoy Titan? How many cheeseburgers do you think Titan has hidden up there?

I guess you'll have to login to find out!

Easy on the Eyes

As we mentioned earlier, the early game experience is getting a drastic overhaul, starting with the login and class selection screens. We will also be refreshing the look of the base armors and styles to reflect this graphical overhaul. This might not be tremendously exciting to our veteran players, but it will make EpicDuel 1000% more appealing to new players, expanding the total number of active players, which means more opponents for you!  

WHY NO UPDATE?!

With all the changes to the database structure and game code, we literally cannot release before it's ready.  Also, preparing a weekly release would divert time away from development on Omega, and we cannot spare a second at this point!

On that note -- Code Sorcerer, away!

Tags: Titan promotions Omega Frysteland Winter Obliterator Onslaughter Yeti HeroMart Shirt Enhancements Stats code TRizZzCENTRINO Update Holiday Seasons Epic Skills Weapons alydriah

October 24, 2012

In my part of the world, the leaves are changing, cool air is blowing on one’s face, everyone’s wearing (or, if you’re me, knitting) sweaters hats and gloves, and everything is pumpkin-flavored. Yes, it’s autumnn, and with the cool weather comes Nature’s bounty: a harvest. Delta V’s Harvest Festival is also soon approaching, with the return of last year’s Harvest content. This includes missions, the Harvest Husk, and the Harvest Reaper and Soul Reaper. These powerful limited rare mutating weapons include a 13% chance to attack your enemy with a rain of gourdy pain with the Jack O Fire skill!

The Harvest is also pulling up some new Harvest content, such as the Cardboard Crusader. This armor will be available for credits... though you probably shouldn’t wear it outside in the rain.

To commemorate the Harvest of Souls, Snork is forging an item commemorating his people’s history. What is it? Well, he hasn’t told me, but he did say that the most valiant warriors who can prove themselves in armed combat with him will have a chance to hold this mysterious rare item!

Oh My Gourd!

The amazing Charfade just revealed that she's created a big ol' pile of pumkins for your home decorating pleasure! Get your home ready for Trick and/or Treating this Friday!

I Can Has Suggestions, Plz? 

But that’s not all! After sifting through the bounty of awesome player suggestions, the Player Suggestion Shop will once again be open! Everyone whose item was chosen will receive their item in their inventory (regardless of cost, level, or class) and the Epic Artist achievement!*

*Massive apologies, but the Player Suggestion Shop will take a bit more time to finish. We tried to work through some technical difficulties, but ultimately couldn't finish it for today. We will have it out next Wednesday, fittingly enough, for Halloween! Stay tuned for more previews on Nightwraith's Twitter.

Spooooooky Countdown! 

The Spooky Head contest is still going on, but you’re running out of time- the contest ends this Friday, just before midnight Saturday. More details here: http://forums2.battleon.com/f/tm.asp?m=20723387

A Balanced Diet

Speaking of the forums, you may have noticed that, rather than cramming all balance discussions into one topic in EDGD, we’ve implemented a Balance Discussion subforum in the EpicDuel section of the AEF. If you’ve been on the fence about joining the AEF, now seems to be the best time to do so! http://forums2.battleon.com/f/tt.asp?forumid=415

Cover Your Torso!

As the cold autumn winds start to blow, now is the perfect time to acquire some coverings for your torsos! To help with this, HeroMart is introducing a new shirt to commemorate our 10 Year Anniversary as a company. Among the bonuses this shirt will give in the other games, in EpicDuel you will receive an exclusive sword, Artix's Triumph.  

Stats

Level: 30
Damage: 32
Strength Req: 30
Dexterity Req: 30
Technology Req: 30
Support Req: 0
Strength +: 2
Dexterity +: 10
Technology +: 10
Support +: 2

Something About a Dragon?

In addition to new shirts, HeroMart will also be stocking One-Eyed Doll's latest Album, "Something About a Dragon" which includes music from AE's games! 

As an in-game reward for purchasing the CD, in EpicDuel you will receive both One-Eyed Axes!  If you missed them in-game, this is the perfect opportunity to pick them up! If you already have them, you'll still have an awesome CD and two weapons you can resell for bonus currency!

Onward! To Victory!

So, what’s next? After this week, we’ll be plunging into building the next phase of EpicDuel, along with a pretty cool winter event (will it involve yetis? Quite possibly!) and Nightwraith promised to have some preview art up for you guys. Obviously, we’re all very excited about this prospect and we hope our players will be as well! :D

Revamped Mercenary concept by Thyton!

Tags: Cinderella Fall Autumn harvest balance Rabble Forums pumpkin Halloween Cardboard Crusader Snork Missions Seasons suggestions Shirts HeroMart