The Ultima Online team has received another set of questions last week. Here are the answers.

Concerns

People using high Seas boats, moored along side each other, to ‘house hide’ in PvP.  
Mesanna: We have written this up as a bug and hope to have it fixed soon. 

Questions

Are there any plans to make gargoyle horn dye and/or restyle available on hairdressers? Daslo, Neverplay UO, Cerwin Vega
Mesanna: After speaking with the team we think Horn Dressers is a good idea…Thanks  for the suggestion.

Are there any plans to revamp Doom? By this I mean changing or evolving the bosses, changing the loot, artifact pool or drop mechanics. There are several problems, for one an increase in players causes more bosses to spawn, however there is no obligation to complete a full round (which would be my definition of running a gauntlet), so people do the 5 rooms then leave before the Dark Fathers, usually leaving one skilled soloer to spend 30 mins plus killing each of them. Now we have gargoyles some gargoyle drops should probably also be included. (CKTC, ask the devs)
Mesanna: CKTC,  Doom is on our list, it needs updated as much as champ spawns, dungeons and  peerless do.

So awhile ago, I inquired about this and someone said the refer a friend program would be making a return. I recall someone saying the program would be back, but now I can’t find where this was said. Is there any chance the program will be making a return soon? I am asking because there are many players who gave their accounts away or sold them. Some of them that I have pestered mean to return via the trial so it would be really great to get referred by them if the referral program returns. (Sablestorm, Stratics)
Mesanna: Sablestorm, at this time we are not starting up the Buddy Referral program.  With all the account management changes this is something that was not moved into the new system and would require.

A while back I read about EA’s plan for WAR/UO/DAoC: They planned to switch from ‘continuing content patches’ to so called ‘booster packs’. For UO that resulted in the ‘High Seas booster’ and the ‘Gothic’ and ‘Rustic’ theme packs. My question is: Will you continue to add boosters? And if so, will they be more in the line with the theme packs or the High Seas expansion? What is the timeframe in which you will add new content (other then differently colored items…  . (from Knuckleheads.dk)
Mesanna: No UO is not going to be working on a booster pack or a theme pack for a while. We want to take the time to do a big bug push. We want to put in an in game Vendor Search, we want to be able to update the outdated armor in the game, we want to improve the fishing rewards, we want to finish virtues, and we want to finish the high res art.  So at this time we don’t have a booster pack or expansion in the works. I am not saying we never well but just not at this time.

When will the Virtue system be completed? (from Knuckleheads.dk)
Mesanna: We have come up with several ideas but just don’t feel they are worthy of the last two virtues.  We have read some of your ideas on stratics but would love to hear more.

Will the “brainstormed” Order/Chaos involve Warfare in usual None-PvP areas, Such as trammel? (from Knuckleheads.dk)
Mesanna: We have not gotten that far in the discussions with this, hopefully we can talk to everyone during the 15th Anniversary Party and get a good discussion going.  Since a lot of you are not able join us we will also start a thread when we are at the point of go or no go on the project.

Non-medable armor is underpowered compared to medable armor. Is there any plans to boosting non-medable armor without ruining the usefulness of leather? (from UOForums.com)
Mesanna: We are in discussion regarding updating armor, making all armor useful again. We are going to do our best not to mess up leather but still make the other materials a viable option.

It is very bad impression goldspammers leave on newbies and returners, with the default channel being help, trials unable to change, and returners often not know they can switch channels. Could you at least make the default channel “General” if the account privileges grants access to it? (from UOForums.com)
Stephen: If you account is not a trial account we will make the change to have the default as general instead of help, this will be made in one of the upcoming publishes. Trail accounts will still be placed in the help channel. Please keep in mind the gold spammers are trial accounts those have to stay in the help channel.

Is it possible to see if your character is friended to the Ants? If not wish they could make something on the character sheet.(Ingame Question from Drachenfels)
Mesanna: Currently there is not a way to tell if your friended to the ants other than not getting attacked. It is something we can add in the future so I will add it to the backlog.

Still I must ask, Will you please fix houses to allow more than 10 Co-owners? Many of us have multiple accounts and are sick and tired of being nothing but a Friend in our own homes… I know I’m not alone and I know I’ve asked time and time again but PLEASE can we have at least 70 co-owner slots on our house. From MalagAste, Uhall. Risso, Ask the Devs (Clarification: Only the owning account characters are all counted as owning. Subsequent account characters are treated individually. Therefore it is not possible to co-own more than 8 characters from other accounts, any above that number can only be friended.)
Mesanna: Everyone will be happy to hear (or I hope they will be) that we as a team have talked about it and want to make a change to the housing co owners.  Instead of 10 co owners we want to change it to 10 accounts which is 70 players total. 

If you have something you want to know about Ultima Online and the team, post your questions on your fansite. All interesting questions will be collected and send to our team, so we can continue to answer them.

Yarrr!

Prepare yourself for adventure when Ultima Online: High Seas sets sail October 12, 2010

For $14.99 USD, players will enjoy:

• Brand new NPC Ship Combat with enhanced ship-to-ship combat and damage states
• Bank/Character Storage Increase, Sea Markets, new fish, fishing buffs, and recipes, paintable boats, Level 7 Treasure Chests and new boss encounters: the Scalis and Corgul the Soulbinder
• All new ship combat! Features include new ship to ship combat,  ship weapons and ammunition, and NPC Ship Combat (Pirates and Merchants)
• New ship types, Tokuno, Orc, and Gargoyle with customizable hues. New cannon types and ammunition!

Buy it today!

* After purchasing High Seas, consumers will receive a retail registration code to be entered into the account center at: https://accounts.eamythic.com.

Verbal Harassment

Verbal Harassment is almost by definition a frustrating experience for those affected. Unfortunately we continue to see a few mistakes that turn many potentially valid harassment reports into situations we cannot assist with. As your glorious GM overlords we suggest following the steps below to avoid these problems:

1. Do not exchange insults or taunts with the harassing player. This is by far the most common mistake we see. If both parties are involved in harassment or the reporting player instigated the situation then it becomes mutual harassment and a GM will not intervene for either side.
2. Ask the player politely, by name, to stop. For example: “Please stop insulting me.”
3. Stop talking to the player. You may also want to leave the area.
4. Add the player to your ignore list (In Options under Filter Options.)
5. Wait a few seconds and if the harassing player still does not stop then you should immediately report them. Do not wait more than a minute or two after this point to report them and do not log out of the game before reporting them. Open your Help menu, choose “Another player is harassing me”, then pick “VERBAL HARASSMENT”.
6. You will be prompted to enter some details about who and what you are reporting. Keep this short and to the point. For example: “Acheren will not stop calling my llamas fat”.
7. Select the harassing player as a target.  There are a number of ways to add targets, the most common methods are “Target Involved Players” which allows you to simply click on the character you wish to report and “Type Names of Involved Players” which allows you to type in the character name even if they are no longer online.  You can always include a target, even if the other player has left the area or gone offline. This is the second most common mistake because with no target included the GM cannot see the chat logs and may not even be able to determine who exactly you are reporting. As a result the GM will not be able to investigate your report in any way and your petition will be closed.

Disruptive Behavior

Be aware that in addition to the Verbal Harassment policy there is also a seperate Disruptive Behavior policy. Disruptive Behavior applies to the use of Vulgarity, Racism, and Objectionable Content in public chat channels such as the General channel. Unlike Verbal Harassment you do not need to ask players to stop or take any other additional steps prior to reporting this behavior. Unlike the default channels we do not tolerate the use of profanity in public chat channels so for Disruptive Behavior you may simply witness a player using vulgarity a few times in a public channel and skip straight to reporting them. For rather obvious reasons this means you should avoid responding to such players with more vulgarity in those same public chat channels lest you both end up in jail.

Physical Harassment

Physical Harassment can present itself in many forms, from luring monsters to grief play. It is considered physical harassment when a player performs an act that has no other purpose than intentional malice or annoyance. This includes but is not limited to luring, casting unwanted spells, opening “death gates”, and releasing dangerous pets, also using game mechanics to flag others criminal, following players to multiple areas or trapping players as well as trapped boxes.

The steps to report a player for physical harassment are identical to verbal harassment apart from selecting PHYSICAL HARASSMENT instead of VERBAL HARASSMENT in the Help menu.

You may find a great deal of additional information on harassment here under Policies and Rules.

Have you visited1Up.com’s website today? They posted an interesting article about Ultima Online.

“It’s actually this near-total anarchy that most sets UO apart from what came after. Nobody had done anything quite like this before, and it shows. While today MMOs have become mostly formulaic and carefully manage player progression, interaction, class balancing, and just generally make sure that the entire experience is a known quantity, Ultima Online faced no such constraints. There was no “common sense” when it came to this sort of thing, and while the kitchen-sink approach of providing everything one would expect from a single-player RPG and then letting a few thousand people play with it at once had occasionally disastrous consequences, it also led to the kind of freedom and surprise that one doesn’t often encounter in a modern MMO.”

 Check out the complete article.

We will perform an extended maintenance on all Asian shards tonight, starting at 6pm EDT (10pm GMT). At this time we expect the additional downtime to last no longer than one hour.

Thank you for your support.

   Having defeated the Purple Llamas of Great Lakes to open the 2012 Treasure Hunt season, the Gold Diggers received a well-earned break from action. Such rest is temporary, however, as they have been called upon by a new Challenger – Lake Superior shard!

It has been many years since the Legend shard’s prejudicial past. But, one cannot forgive the way the people of this shard once looked down upon others simply for being different. It is unjust. It goes against the very Virtues that this game has tried to instill. In less than two weeks after UO: Renaissance was introduced, in May of 2000, the home shard of the Gold Diggers was formed. A shard…exclusively for AOL users. Bah!

      Lake Superior. One of the original four shards. A place of rights. Respect. A place where no man should be looked down upon, merely for his choice of ISP. We’re the unmarred shard. We got the lakes that’ll give you the quakes. Enough roleplay to fill Norway. And we’ve got the sublime rhyme that’d make a mime chime.

    For the good of Sosaria, no matter which shard of the Gem you reside, Lake Superior challenges the Gold Diggers of Legends. Your past as despicable AOL’ers is as inescapable as our future as the Cross Shard Treasure Hunt Champions.

Having been roused by this upstart, the team from Legends responded strongly:

Will the deeds of the Lake Superior treasure hunters be as great as their professed ideals? Or will they join Great Lakes in a pit of foes vanquished by the Diggers? Find out Saturday, March 3rd as the Cross Shard Treasure Hunting Challenge continues!

Date: Saturday, March 3rd
Time: 8pm CST, 9pm EST
Place: Nujel’m Chessboard, Test Center Shard

Spectators are encouraged to come and cheer on their favorite team! Gates will be provided from the New Haven bank prior to and during the event.

Greetings,

The login servers are now available.

We are experiencing an issue with the UO login servers. The login servers are temporarily down. This will not affect those already logged in to UO. We will have more information on a fix shortly.

Thank you for bearing with us

The UO Team

Update 1am EST: The issue has been corrected and the access to the shard is restored.

We have been informed by our service provider that there are issues to connect to shard Oceania.

The situation is under investigation. Keep an eye on the Herald for updates.

Update: The issue has been resolved and you should now receive your codes again.

If you want to buy codes for Ultima Online on Origin today, you might encounter a noticeable delay between the purchase and the delivery of the codes.

The store team is investigating this issue and we will inform you as soon as the situation returned to normal.

We are looking at fixing the issue regarding faction points and the deterioration of faction points. To fix these issues properly it will require us to wipe all faction points.

The fix will soon be available for testing on Test Center 1. We invite all of you to transfer your characters to TC1 and experience the changes as soon as it is ready.

Keep an eye on the Herald.