Hello there,
For those who may have no clue who I am, I run the systems area for Dragonrealms. It's my responsibility to monitor and or modify the "systems" we use here in DR along with a host of very talented GM's.
Over the years we've constantly upgraded a large portion of DR for the benefit of long-term enjoyment of the players. This includes keeping the challenge of DR alive. You've heard it numerous times that DR is an ever-evolving game with no end that allows players to grow and interact with both each other and the environment. To that end you will see some pretty hefty upgrades in the near future especially in regards to magic and combat.
Why are we doing this now? It's nothing new. We've tweaked and modified these systems over the years to keep up the excitement factor many times. In addition, while we have made in most cases minor tweaks, it's time to to do some major ones also. Over the years we've constantly kept an eye on such major systems as combat and magic but havn't had the manpower to really take them apart. Other projects have consumed a lot of our time (glances over at the large crowd standing in front of an unopened province). It hasn't been until recently (approximatly the last 6 months) that we've had the additional GM's to start going into the "meat" of some of our largest systems.
With all that said, here are some things we have planned for the near future. You should keep a watch on the login banner in the game or NEWS for additional information:
Parry was using an incorrect formula. Basicly you only really had two options happening. You were either 100% successful or 0%. The new formula will make it what it was intended to do. Be a sliding scale (think of a 45 degree angle). Impact will be those who were failing a lot will do a little better. Those who were doing "perfect" each time will fail a little more.
Draw has too low an RT. It was never intended to be the same as a jab. It will be modified up by at least 1 second.
Natural creature attacks will be getting the AI upgrade that we implemented for weapon carrying creatures some time back.
Exp caps will be implemented. What this means is at a certain point lower level creatures will not be able to give you any experience as you move higher in skills/levels. In addition, the payout of exp will depend more on your combat ability. Currently it's a little too forgiving in handing out exp. Whether in your mind you consider this a good thing or a bad thing will be an individual decision.
Some other areas we're double-checking are shields and reflex/agility in combat. For the latter, players aren't really getting much of a benefit at higher levels with certain weapons.
These changes will not occur all at once. We will intergrate them slowly over the coming weeks. As we've mentioned before in other posts, while we can test "hypotheticly" in our development area, once 1000+ players start hitting it over and over, we see different results in many cases. We will monitor and tweak as is necessary as we've always done but it's important that we do put these changes in so that the core systems are ready to handle much higher level players in the game.
I (we) appreciate everyones understanding as we make these upgrades available and look forward to reading your posts for feedback as they are applied.
Thank you,
Senior Gamemaster Smitty
