Greetings,

Here are the publish notes to accompany publish 75 coming to TC1. Read and enjoy!

Publish 75.0.0

Global Arc

Acts 3 and 4 for the awakening have been completed.  Please keep an eye on your Town Criers for upcoming news.  Continue on with this quest and you too can have your own heirlooms.  As always watch the herald for future fiction.

Clean up Britannia – 4 new dyes

• Glossy Fuchsia
• Deep Blue
• Vibrant Seagreen
• Murky Amber

Faction Score System

• All faction scores will be reset to 0
• All Faction members will return to Rank 1
• Faction score now decays at a rate of 1% (rounded down) of score per day. Scores of 199 or below will decay 1 point per day. Scores of 200 to 299 lose 2 points per day, etc..
• Players with 0 Faction score will always be assigned Rank 1 and are no longer counted in Faction membership totals when determining the size of ranking brackets.

Faction Pet Combat Fixes

• Faction players may now order their pets to attack member of the same faction
• Pets will now correctly guard against attacks from same-faction players
• If a faction player attacks the summoned creature of a member of the same faction, the summoned creature will retaliate
• Summoned creatures will attack aggressors who are in the same faction as the summoner

Commodity Broker Fixes

• 
   Commodity Brokers can now deal in brilliant amber, parrot wafers, taint, putrefaction, scourge, and all Spellweaving scrolls
• 
   Commodity Brokers now identify and can trade in exceptionally crafted commodities. Any exceptional items that are “hidden” in Commodity Broker inventory will become accessible by the owner, allowing retrieval or price setting.
• 
   The Commodity Broker window has been widened to better accomodate the longer commodity item names
• 
   Enhanced Bandages are now named “Enhanced Bandage” instead of “Clean Bandage”
• 
   Commodity Brokers now deal in Enhanced Bandages

Poison Cure Changes – Increased chance to Cure

Greater Cure Potion:

25% chance to cure lethal poison

45% chance to cure deadly poison

75% chance to cure greater poison

100% chance to cure standard and lesser poison

Cure Potion:

15% chance to cure lethal poison

30% chance to cure deadly poison

50% chance to cure greater poison

100% chance to cure standard and lesser poison

Lesser Cure Potion:

5% chance to cure lethal poison

10% chance to cure deadly poison

15% chance to cure greater poison

40% chance to cure standard poison

100% chance to cure lesser poison

• It is no longer possible to obtain extra empty bottles by drinking Invisibility Potions
• The Damage Eater property now counts as a property for Imbuing and Unraveling purposes. The property weight is 90%; the normal cap is 6% (this is 100% intensity), and the “overcap” maximum is 9% (150% intensity). A 9% Damage Eater counts as 135% weighted intensity.
• Items turned in for Clean Up Britannia now only go to the Cavern of the Discarded at the intended 1% rate.
• NPCs can no longer become Angry Rioters or Angry Protesters if they are in the Yew Prison
• Players can no longer attack prisoners in Wrong. Monsters, however, still can attack the prisoners as they are being escorted.
• The Britannian Ship now travels at maximum ship speed, whether it was initially placed from drydock or from a new deed.
• Players mounts will no longer randomly become auto-stabled on login
• Archery no longer allows players to trigger special moves on weapons with Use Best Weapon Skill
• 
  Potion Kegs now update their weight when used on a gardening plant
• 
  Brokers will no longer open the gates to their animal pens
• 
  Shame and Wrong loot generation now produces better quality item from tougher creatures
• 
  City Banner deeds can be purchased from the City Guards by those with sufficient City Loyalty
• 
  There are two new foundation sets in House Customization: Gothic and Board and Batten (require account entitlements)
• 
  Scroll of Alacrity effect will now pause when the character logs out and the timer resumes on next login
• 
  The Focusing Gem of Virtue Bane can no longer be used on runic hammers
• 
  Shame monsters now have Fame and Karma ratings more in line with their toughness
• 
  The Hungry Ogre no longer drops an empty bag as part of its loot 

• Snow has been removed from Britannia
• Reduced duration of the slow walk effect for splintering weapons to correct time of 4 seconds
• Mobs are no longer able to bleed attack players who are in bleed attack immune forms.
• Soul Charge properly works on the cool down period for 40 seconds.
• Bestial Suit (Berserk Effect) Update: Players can no longer remain in stealth while in rage. Berserk timeout duration lowered to 5 seconds from 15
• Increased natural poison resistance to 20% of the player’s poisoning skill.
• If you are wearing Morph Earrings your elven items will not be sent to your bank upon death
• The Dryad bow will no longer spawn with a throwing skill
• Players have to be within 2 tiles to dress a Mannequin or vendor
• Night Terrors will no longer teleport players  to a stuck location
• The Binding rope is blessed now
• The Pilots wheel will retain being blessed in deed form
• Norton the Fisher should no longer be missing from the New Haven Docks
• You will no longer to make exceptional Enchanted Apple.
• If a runebook hue is 0, it will no longer be changed to default hue automatically.
• Black dye tub will have a localized name.
• You will be able to add “blessed” status to various hooded robes.

Classic client  7.0.24

Classic Client Patcher Update

The classic client patcher has now been updated to streamline the patching process for the Classic Client.  This change should cut down on patching errors a lot of our players have experienced.  A new installer can be found on our download page.

• Cliloc Changes
• Fixed client crash during the intro movie

Enhanced Client  4.0.24

Item Property Classifier

The character abilities window now features a detailed listing with descriptions of all active item properties that your character has from equipment. It also displays a detailed list of all available properties that can be displayed.

• Fixed crash when dynamic objects or mobiles are drawn and deleted continually.
• Cliloc Changes

     So just what happened at the Legends vs. Lake Superior T-hunt challenge?

     Legends’ defending champions, the Gold Diggers were geared up and ready to rock and roll!  You could tell this was a team prepared for anything.  Well almost anything as would soon been seen, but I’m getting ahead of myself… The Gold Diggers members included, Hawk Eye, Casper, InViSiBlE, Bulldog, and Nadalia.

     Lake Superior’s team drifted in, no team color, no name and one or two of their members had been recruited only an hour or two before.  Did any of this bother them?  Not in the least!  They were here to battle for their shard, and they intended to win!  Their newly acquired team name reflected their attitude; team Awesome Sauce.  The members of this team were, Taeara Mi’aken, Rockhound, Draken, All Mighty, and Kalina.

     Introductions made, rules read and it was game on!  Both teams were off like a shot, but Murphy and his law of ‘what can go wrong, will go wrong’ always seems to come into play during the first few maps. 

     For Lake Superior’s Awesome Sauce, it was finding that first chest.  Dig here, dig there, dig dig dig.  Where’s the chest?? 

     Legends’ Gold Diggers had no problems with map one.  It was map two when Murphy showed himself.  The Gold Diggers decoded the map, and then realized they didn’t have a rune to the general location of the chest.  There was only one way they would be able to get to the chest – by boat.  Did any of them have a boat?  No.  So off they went on a shopping spree in Luna.

     This allowed Lake Superior’s Team Awesome Sauce to catch up and get ahead (slightly) of Legends’ Gold Diggers.  But Murphy wasn’t done yet.  Lake Superior’s team Awesome Sauce was his next victim. 

     With map three completed the team Awesome Sauce is waiting to trade the completed map for the next map.  Their t-hunter had one problem, ‘I lost the map!’  The verdict was passed down to give the team the new map and let them go.  ‘Take the map and go!’ The trade window drops.  ‘Take the map and go!’  By then the t-hunter had found the completed map and drops it into the trade window, maps exchanged, they were off!

     The two teams were now neck and neck right to the very end when Legends’ team Gold Diggers gated in and sat down a mere 35 seconds – that’s right, seconds before Lake Superior’s team Awesome Sauce.

     Congratulations to Legends’ team Gold Diggers the winners of this t-hunt match!  And to Lake Superior’s team Awesome Sauce, a job well done! 

Sosaria Reels had the chance to grab Jeff Skalski, the Ultima Franchise Producer and published the video interview today.

Head over to Stratics and see what Jeff has to say about his job, about our plans for Ultima Online and about the 15th anniversary.

Greetings Intrepid Adventurers of Sosaria!

We are pleased to kickoff the next chapter in our epic live event, The Awakening.  Act II will no doubt bring you face to face with unseen perils within the wilds of Ilshenar.  Many of you have been inquiring about the strange collapses within the Mountain passes there, perhaps these require further investigation? We encourage you to explore the area and wish you the best of luck in your adventures!

See you in game,
The UO Team
 

Written by the EM Team

     “Look, if you listen to me and stick close and keep your mouth shut we’re not going to have any problems. And now that you’ve gotten us this far, I’m taking the lead.” Callie grumbled quietly to her guide as they crept silently through the metallic passageways and past numerous sentries. She wiped a hand across her brow and brushed her blonde bangs from her face.  “We just need to make sure we don’t get spotted”. As they passed near one of the far walls of the mapped area, Balthan the guide found his attention caught by a long rusted wreck of machinery and slagged walls. Just as he was about to comment he felt himself run into the back of the archaeologist in front of him who turned and glared at him. “Watch where you’re going.” She hissed fiercely under her breath. She gestured for Balthan to turn around and began to remove some special equipment from his pack, tools that were not fashioned by human hands. With the tools in hand, she began to dismantle the mounting of one of the peculiar glowing wall panels, and removing a large console nearby with multicolored buttons. She spoke excitedly and quietly while she did so. “This will be the find of the century, you know. It’ll be put in the Vesper museum with our names on it and they’ll never forget us.”
 

     With a snipping noise she managed to disconnect the last strut holding the console in place, and she tucked the tools back into the guides pack. She removed the strange panel first and broke the wires going to it and tucked it into the guides pack. Grasping the console, she tugged and pulled, but she couldn’t seem to remove it. She changed the way she grasped at it, and felt the strangely colored shapes on the front give way slightly, before she managed to rip the console away from the final bolt holding it in place. As it came away the structure seemed to pulse around them, energy flowing through conduits in the structure as she hurriedly tucked the console away. “Let’s get out of here while we’ve still got the chance.” A vicious tremor began to run through the structure, strong enough that she felt herself shift from side to side. “Time to go”, Callie said as she removed two of the recall scrolls from the pack, handing one to the guide and waiting for him to go. As Balthan vanished from sight, a red robed mage rounded the corner and began to chant words of power, and as she cast the words of power to recall she felt a blinding pain as her body  teleported, and then there was blackness.

     Harlann adjusted the scratchy robes that disguised her true identity as she left the city of Lakeshire and made her way through one of the shimmering blue portals. Despite her familiarity with their magical nature she always felt a tingle of trepidation at utilizing the portals, but soon found herself back at the white marble building that ensconced the gate that served the shrine of Compassion. Disguised as one of the meer’s mages, she found that many of the more irritating creatures such as the ratmen gave her a wide berth. She’d gone against the Shirron’s wishes to visit the Meer, but she’d managed to gather important information, and she was certain that the Shirron would forgive her when she presented this new revelation to him. She quickly went over in her mind what she would say as she made her way to the mountain passage that led through to the castle that the Jukan’s had been using as a fortress for some time. The nightmares and visions that had been plaguing their kind were not universal, but they were shared by the Meer; The Meer did not have an explanation for the phenomena nor was it an attempt by them to attack the Jukans; And perhaps most importantly of all, none of the gargoyles of Ver Lor Reg nor any of the gypsies in their encampments reported similar things. As she passed through the mountainside passage she felt a vicious tremor run through the tunnel and a shaking of the ground that caused her sense of balance to momentarily dizzy her.

     Bursting through into the sunlight, she could feel the immense power that was being channeled due to the way it raised her hackles. No Jukan mage could be the source of this kind of power, so it must be an attack. “Evacuate, brethren! This is an attack!” The startled guards turned at what sounded like a Jukan voice, but squared themselves off with her on sight of her Meer outfit. She quickly took a breath and centered herself in the Art of the Way, and charged forward with her staff held at one side. She had no time to argue with them, and instead feinted left before fluidly slipping past the guard on the right and sending him crashing to the ground with a well placed strike to the back of his knee. She planted the staff into the ground hard and vaulted midway up the castle’s wall, scaling it quickly as her own people’s arrows glanced off the walls around her.

     The entire castle was shaking as she managed to reach the apex. Tumbling and diving, she narrowly evaded one of the mechanical Juggernaut’s charges by planting her iron sheathed staff between herself and it’s mighty drill and spinning past it, breaking through to one of the back corner stairwells. As one of the red robed controllers fled past her, she saw him stop and begin to unleash a spell, but she’d already made it to the other side of the room and dove down a set of stairs, rolling and coming up on her feet at the bottom. Her body groaned in protest from the impact of the stairs but she refused to let it break her concentration. Her Shirron was mere seconds away and she ran for the door even as the whole structure suddenly seemed to leap a few feet to one side. She flung open the door just as a berserk juggernaut crashed through a wall in front of her and out into the sunlight. She rushed past it and jerked on the handle of the door to the Shirron’s chambers and stepped through as a lightning fast arm reached out and grabbed her by the throat, lifting her high above the ground. She attempted to choke out a warning but could not past the iron grip of the towering Juka in front of her, until she managed to remove her cowl, and the Shirron let her fall to the ground.

     “I hope you can explain this, Waymaster Harlann. A massive magical attack by the Meer just as you return from a spying expedition I refused to authorize?”

     “Shirron, we must evacuate. This is not an attack by the Meer, and they are suffering the same as we are, but we must flee!”

     “A Shirron of the Juka does not flee from any foe!”

     “The Juka need their leader. Forgive me, Great Mother.” With that, Waymaster Harlann twirled forward, bringing her staff around feinting towards her leader with it, before dropping and sweeping his legs. As the massive Jukan hit the ground a fresh tremor arose and she leveled a devastating blow of her staff to his temple, before throwing her staff aside. With the Shirron unconscious, she managed to get him on her back and stagger her way out through the hole that the juggernaut had left. As she did so she heard a loud twang of a bowstring as her right leg gave out from underneath her. Glancing down she could see the shaft of the arrow sticking out of her calf, but she rose to her feet again as the ground began to give way and the shouts from the fortress redoubled. Blasts of magic from Jukan mages and arrows peppered the area around her, until she felt her vision flash white from the effects of a mind blast spell.  She focused herself in the Way once more and pushed her screaming muscles as hard as she could, managing to get outside of where she could feel the center of the magic before her leg surrendered to the wound and she fell gracelessly to the ground. As she felt blackness creeping into the edges of her vision, a hundred or more screams rose up at once from the castle behind her and then suddenly were no more. She could still feel the ground shaking and she drew on every reserve of energy she could muster, forcing herself to push farther, her vision blurring and swaying as she did, and the weight of her Shirron pulling harder with each passing moment. She felt the terrain changing beneath her feet, as grass gave way to dirt, and dirt to sand. She could feel the Shirron’s heavy breathing even as everything seemed to be falling apart around her. A cacophonic noise unlike anything she’d ever heard ripped through the air and sent a cloud of debris and smoke raining throughout the area as she stumbled to her knees amidst a set of grand pillars in the desert. “Great Mother save us…” she whispered as rocks and pieces of the castle rained down into the desert around her before she mercifully succumbed to the encroaching darkness.