Guides and links to older threads

[Korruptor]

First off:
Thanks to the Admin for creating these fine sub-forums for each game to help keep it all organized!

This thread will be for organizing links to old threads and outside information on multiboxing Anarchy Online.

Wiki?
For any curious there is a a section in the Wiki with some good info on the game and multiboxing it.

Want to help make the game more multiboxing friendly? We can use your help!
1) Modifying the /follow command is one thing that would help. Please see this thread. Here is an older thread on the same subject but it got a bit derailed.

UPDATE SUMMARY (as of 2009/11/20)

• Instanced cities - done. You can access your personal city instance in ICC to Serenity Islands.
• Instanced Pande - done.
• In-Game mail - done.
• Perk reset option - reset all perks once every two days at no cost. To reset again within the two day time-frame carries a (20mil?) credit fee.
• Dark Ruins: Solo and team instance in Adonis. Good exp and the team instance drops "...of the goddess" armor.
• Complete overhaul of all perks - in progress. When the perks changes go live they will permit everyone to change breed and gender.
• Daily Mission system - in progress. A new alternative for gaining large amounts of exp.

[Korruptor]

Fan sites:

General game information and guides:
AO Universe - This site has the best information on quests, guides to area's and a good deal of trade skill information.
AO Vault - This site has good information but not as through (in my experience) as AO-Universe.
AODEVS - Good info here, they also host the now defunct but widely loved Arcanum site
ARCANUM - A bit dated but lots of well documented how-to's.

Item search engines:
AODBUS *New
www.auno.org

Trade skill sites:
www.tirschool.com

UI's:
AOUI from AO-Universe

[Korruptor]

This section has been edited to reflect just the facts.


May 22nd
"The Engine

We have been working on the conversion to Ogre for quite some time now...and there have been good days...and bad days. The team has really done a great job and it has been amazing to watch AO slowly move towards a day where we could release the game "fresh" with the upgraded look the AO world deserves. The problem with this journey is a matter of time and the destination. While the Ogre engine is an excellent choice it is just not providing the full featureset that we originally hoped to would deliver...moreover to add those features seems to be a task with ever growing estimates....which is something our small team can not afford, nor expect our players to wait for. When the decision to go with Ogre was made the engine used for Conan was in its adolescence...it ran but it was gangly, awkward and had stability issues. After two years of constant work by a large and brilliant render team the engine used by Conan runs beautifully and stably and offers a great number of complete features that would require additional years of work in Ogre. With the delays due to difficulties associated with optimization of Ogre to work well with current AO and the estimated timelines for a full implementation of the Conan engine (Dreamworld Engine/Cheetah) being nearly identical we were faced with a difficult decision."


May 29th
"Balancing Efforts

Some criticism (understatement) has been made concerning the "band-aid" style fixes to some professions. Keep in mind some of these changes ARE temporary while we work out the larger issues of retooling all specials and healing. A temporary fix means that the most affected professions can perform adequately while we make more significant changes without having to wait until we are done to be effective. Slapping an AS weapon on everyone is not the current team's idea of balance...big changes are necessary. We know and we are working on it."

[Korruptor]

Friday with Means - November 6th, 2009 - Back in the saddle!

The Mail System

Thanks to all who have been a big help in testing and shaping the new mail system with great suggestions. So far everything seems very stable and I think we can all look forward to this long awaited addition hitting the live servers soon. This has been a "big" change to all item and inventory systems in AO and as a result has been holding back some of the other content we have been working on...having this out will allow us to push out some of the new larger experiences/changes we have been waiting on for some time.

The Engine

Work is progressing very well. I was thrilled this week to come back and see proper water technology implemented and LOOKING GREAT in game. Next Friday we will be posting screenshots (at a bare minimum...I am hoping for more) to show the current state of the ongoing work. I am very pleased with the performance level of the current client given that the integration is still ongoing and the optimization efforts have not really begun...I think we can all look forward to reasonably significant performance increases despite the addition of a great new level of visual detail and effects. It is going to be great to finally leave AO's CPU crunching of DX7 behind and take full advantage of todays GFX hardware with proper optimization.

The Daily Mission System

I haven't spoke a lot concerning this over the past few months...not really fair concerning the size and work that have gone into this addition. Lindelu has racked her brain and worked through illness to offer up about 200 new things to do as alternative methods of obtaining XP and I won't spoil any of her creative surprises her except to say that in some cases I couldn't believe she managed to get these experiences to work...they look great and I know we will all enjoy having some new solo alternatives to enjoy to make the most of our playtime...even those times when we don't have the time to commit to team activities. Mass Rollerrat extermination! Dammit...Spoiler!




Friday with Means - November 13th, 2009 - Friday teh 13th 110100101!!!


What today's post lacks in screenshots it should make up for in documentation. FUN! Here are the latest versions (with changes/additions) of the previously released perk documents with the addition of the long awaited first versions of the "Breed" perk lines. We are looking forward to the feedback concerning these changes as this is a delicate area of the game.
~
Kintaii Edit!

Alright guys - We promised you some new screenshots and here they are! I wanna mention that yes, this is still very early stuff, and there are things missing with this version of the Cheetah implementation - We know it's not perfect yet, but we're all really excited at the progress that's been made so far and we just couldn't wait to show it off. =) So without any further ado, here you go - Enjoy!

Rome 1.jpg
Rome 2.jpg
Rome 3.jpg
Tir 1.jpg
Tir 2.jpg
Tir 3.jpg

Alien Breed Perk Lines - Nov. 13th.pdf
Alien Group Perk Lines - Nov. 13th.pdf
Alien Profession Perk Lines - Nov. 13th.pdf
Shadowlands Group Perk Lines - Nov. 13th.pdf
Shadowlands Profession Perk Lines - Nov. 13th.pdf



First!

The first Anarchy Online in-game mail ever was sent by Uberminchen on the Atlantean Dimension today at 14:14:45 edging out XBoxmodoc on Rimor by only one second. Doctelcal was the first player on Die Neue Welt!

Gratz and enjoy the new mail system!

[Thulos]

Nice, thanks for spearheading this. This will come in handy when I go back to the game.

[Korruptor]

Friday with Means - November 20th, 2009 - Nanomage says "Wut?"

Even in my flame retardant teletubby costume I felt the heat from the conversations related to the release of the "first version" of the breed perks last week. I know you guys might find this surprising...but this is a "good" thing. The community is involved, passionate and commited to helping us get this right and I have every confidence that we will get these changes to where they need to go...there was NO chance that those documents were ever going to be implemented in their first-version state...good feedback from ALL our experts is needed. I'm glad I can count on you guys.

That being said a "key" piece of information has been missing with respect the breed perks. Breed perks are currently not "trivial" buffs of little value...it really matters what breed you choose in terms of building your character. The team and I believe that this is part of what makes AO fun...the choice and determination to try out alternate setups to try and push the boundaries of what is possible. Reducing the breed specific perks to irrelevancy would be removing fun from pretty much everyone in the game...nobody wants that. So, the ONLY fair option if we are going to make even SMALL adjustments to breed related actions is to allow everyone to make that important decision again should they so desire.

When these changes are eventually ironed out and they go live EVERYONE will have the opportunity to change breed once (and the sex of your character if you like) for free. This is the only fair way to handle this issue. It is also important to note that when this area is done it should be a very tough decision as we hope to make all breeds a viable choice...and removing abilities from breeds is not the route we intend to take on the way to evening the playfield.

In a sci-fi world why shouldn't breed change be an option?...this is also likely to be an option heading into the future for AO.

[Korruptor]

Friday with Means - November 27th, 2009 - Uphill in 6 feet of snow
~excerpt begin~
The rest of the team has been hard at work on the Daily Missions, working through the profession nanos (there are a LOT of them), Breed Change and associated difficulties, this year's Christmas goodies and of course...the new engine. It sounds like a lot...I guess because it is. We are hoping to bring the new Christmas content to the Test Dimension on Tuesday to get it to Live as soon as possible...after which the Daily Mission system will quickly be deployed to TestLive to be tested until we are all happy that it will launch as smoothly as the new mail system has.

Today's brief downtime for Atlantean (RK1):

There has been a persistant (though rare) server crash issue related to database connectivity. A possible fix to the issue has been deployed to RK1 only that we will be watching closely over the next week. Excellent reason for a quick downtime...if it performs as hoped it will be deployed to all dimensions and bring us very close to the 100% solid server performance we have all been wanting. We are very close now it will be great to finally exorcise the very last of the AO server demons
~excerpt end~

[Korruptor]

Friday with Means - December 4th, 2009 - Who is not at the company party? ME!

My summary: The initial post covers the common questions on the forced move of German players on DNW to RK1.

Here are the real goods on page 16 of the thread:

1. There was only one shot of the new engine (now with Sky!) in the presentation...the sky isn't perfect but now that it is there at all the artists can work with it to make it perfect.

2. A RK mission with upgraded Textures (to note the difference this will make without even using help from the new engine.)

3. A peek at the new Omni "daily mission" office coming in the next major update.

4. Me multi-tasking during the very short period of time I was at the company party.

I was hoping to add a few screens of the engine that were not in the presentation...however the H1N1 is currently victimizing one of my engine guys and I am not going to interrupt the other one who is working on something I want him to finish. Faster Faster!

Engine1.jpg (101.9 KB)
High_res_mission.png (651.8 KB)
scrn0108.jpg (113.7 KB)
DSC_0280.jpg (420.2 KB)

[Korruptor]

Friday with Means - December 11th, 2009 - 16 second rough cut

Imagine what a marketing/video editing guy could do with this...

I am so happy with the progress being made.

The moving grass made my day...I hope it makes yours.

Clicky