Test Center

Notes about Publish 70, Tour, Map of New Magincia, Chance Encounter with Lady Mesanna, No Vendor Search

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Publish 70 is now live, and the client patches have been released. The first thing I noticed – a 92MB patch for the EC. This is only part 1 – I’ve got quite a bit more to bring you, but have to step out for a bit. The second thing I noticed, there were no NPC shops, other than the Inn and the Fishing and Shipwright’s guild, plus the bank.

I was lucky enough, along with quite a few others, to run into Lady Mesanna, Associate Producer for UO. Phoenix, the Lead Designer for UO, was also on hand, answering a few questions. Among those answered – there will be a pet bonding gate installed in New Haven, and according to Phoenix, the idea of a way to search vendors has been discussed, but is not currently being pursued.

Ultima Online - New Magincia

For more on New Magincia, which is the focus of this publish, see Map of New Magincia, Housing Details Released. There is a map of all of the plots below. I’m going to have to seriously revise that post, because there is nothing outside of the bank, Fishing Guild, and the Inn. I’m also going to have to seriously redo the Magincia map below because it’s way too busy.

Ultima Online - New Magincia - Housing Lottery Plots

To me, E-3, SW-1, and SE-1 really stand out. E-3 has a great view and SE-1 and SW-1 are probably the best locations for being near everything else.

This is E-3, and it’s also where I ran into Lady Mesanna, who introduced us to Phoenix, the Lead Designer for UO:

Ultima Online - New Magincia

What’s it like to buy a ticket for the lottery? You are buying a ticket for each plot and it looks like you could buy tickets for every single plot.

Ultima Online - New Magincia Housing

Areas that are “Under Construction” look like this:

Read more

Publish 70 on TC1, Classic Client 7.0.13, Enhanced Client 4.0.13

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Update: March 31, 2011:
* UO Publish 70 notes – Worldwide Release (April 1, 2011)
* UO Publish 70 notes – Origin

As of now (3pm Eastern, 2pm Central), most of the shards are down and will be for a little bit.

Yes, it’s that time once again, Ladies and Gentleman, when another Publish is being prepped and pushed out. Now it’s only going to be active on Test Center 1 for now, with a backup of Great Lakes in place. Because of the client updates (mentioned a few days ago), all servers must be brought down and restarted. The Classic Client is being patched to version 7.0.13, and the Enhanced Client to version 4.0.13:

Publish 70.0 will be available on Test Center 1 after 4pm today. You can find the publish notes as well as the notes for the Classic Client 7.0.13 and the Enhanced Client 4.0.13 below. This client patch is mandatory, please make sure that you get it! Be aware that this patch is larger than usual, as we are pushing the last set of missing animation files.

We encourage you to check out what’s new and thank you for your feedback.

The main things of interest is that once the shards are back up, we can test out the New Magincia lottery system for the 22 plots per shard that are located in New Magincia. There appears to be a little work being done on the New Player Experience, but it’s probably related more to veterans starting new characters. You can now select where you want to start rather than just New Haven, although New Haven is the default for Young players.

Full Publish 70 notes:

Magincia Plot Lotto
* There are 22 lots each in both Trammel and Felucca. The island is divided up by North and South end. The North end is the area towards the beach area and these plots are 10K per ticket and you are allowed to buy one ticket per account per plot. The South end is towards the bank and these are 2K a ticket and there are no ticket purchase limits.

Magincia Planting System
* Players are able to plant seeds in grassy areas around Magincia by using a hoe. The players will have to maintain the upkeep of the seeds to keep them healthy. Only the owner of the seed can take care of the plant . The plant will be tagged with the owners name and the date he/she planted it. Players will be able to dig up the plants after they have matured and they will continue to keep the player’s name, the date planted and the date harvested.

Abyss Quest and Monsters
* Added a new quest in the Abyss, this quest will start with Xeninfor the Security Advisor and he can be found in the Royal Palace. We have also added a few new mobs to challenge your fighting talents.

Bug Fixes
* Veteran Reward Statues such as the Efreet, Harrower, Therathan Matriarch and the Fire Ant can now be turned off an on.
* The issue with fish that are fished up by a non High Seas entitled account not having resources was fixed.
* You can now fish up the new fish in Shame level 4 with the correct entitlement.
* You should now be able to obtain the Magic Key for the Puzzle Room.
* Faction Traps were removed from Magincia
* Players having a false reading of having a ship placed should be fixed
* Magic Reflection: A Murderer using magic reflect will be flagged criminal if they reflect the paralyze spell back onto a blue character
* Detect hidden will once again detect everyone. Detect hidden will apply out of hide timer to detected players that are freely aggressable.
* Splintering weapons do not lose max durability allowing them to proc infinity without destroying the weapon
* Players cannot parry when wielding a throwing weapon and a shield.
* Players who were stuck in a state where they were unable to place a new ship will once again be able to place ships.
* Magincia is no longer part of the Factions system.
* Scalis Eels will now last a maximum of 2 minutes
* Both facings of the kabuto can be dyed with the Metallic dye tub.

Enhanced Client – Starting Locations
* Players can now pick what part of the world you would like for your character to begin. You will have the option to start in New Haven if you wish. Young players can start where ever they like but the default will still be New Haven.

Enhanced Client – Bug Fixes
* Trading an item from one using the Enhanced client to another will carry over the item’s position in the old backpack to the new backpack has been fixed.

Classic Client – Starting Locations
* Players can now pick what part of the world you would like for your character to begin. You will have the option to start in New Haven if you wish. Young players can start where ever they like but the default will still be New Haven.

Publish 70 Test Delayed One Day, Blue Crystal Owners Happy

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So the plan was to roll out the Publish 70/New Magincia to the Test Center tomorrow, using a backup of Great Lakes. That’s been pushed out a day to Thursday, March 17, 2011, however blue crystal owners rejoice, they will be used in the growth and rebuilding of New Magincia. The reason given for the one-day delay is due to some internal testing. The clients will need to be patched, and this will involve a restart and update of all shards on Thursday at 3pm Eastern, 2pm Central. They should be back online within a few hours. Full details:

While the preparation for the launch of Pub 70 to the test center is in full swing, our internal testing on the changes to Magincia require one more day of review. Pub 70 will be available on Test Center this Thursday, March 17.

The client patch for Pub70 requires a server restart. Therefore on Thursday, beginning at 3:00 pm EDT we will bring down all shards. We expect all shards to be back online no later than 5:00 pm EDT.

As an additional note, we have added a purpose for the blue crystals so many players have asked about. They will have a use in the growth of Magincia.

There may have been an additional comment about starting new characters and where their starting location would be, which was tied to the client/shard updates, but it has been removed.

Read: UO Herald

Publish 70, New Magincia Lottery, on Test Center this Wednesday.

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Update: The test has been pushed back to Thursday, however a use for blue crystals is being implemented. Calvin Crowner, the producer of UO, has posted this late bit of breaking news. Ultima Online Publish 70, which should go a long ways towards wrapping up the Magincia storyline, is going to be loaded onto the Test Center this coming Wednesday, March 16, 2011, with a backup of Great Lakes. We will be able to see how the lottery system for New Magincia is going to fully work (more on New Magincia). The period of testing will be extended due to the recent tragedies that have happened and are still happening in Japan, so that hopefully when it is finally published to the production shards, more Japanese players will be able to participate. Given how large of the UO player population is Japanese, I wondered how EA would be handling this. I’ve seen other companies such as Sony suspending billing for people in affected areas.

We will be bringing build 70 to the test center on Wednesday March 16th. As always, we ask that you participate in this test phase and give us your feedback.

However, in light of the events in Japan we will be extending the Test Center phase of this publication. Publish 70 is the end of the live event and the new beginning of Magincia and we want all players to have a chance to participate; and we recognize that there may be many members of our Japanese community who may be unable to participate at this time.

So here is our current release plan for build 70: Test Center Deployment: 03/16. Our expectation is that we will publish to Origin in around 2 weeks. Of course, as events change, we will keep all of the community updated.

We will be putting a back up of Great Lakes on Test Center 1. We hope this encourages you to log in and discover for yourself how the lotto system on Magincia works. In addition to the house plot lotto please enjoy the new system of planting seeds and watching your plants group in the open land of Magincia.

Thank you for your understanding. We are looking forward to getting your feedback and please join us when we say that the hearts and thoughts of our team go out to our Japanese friends.

Read: UO Herald

Next Booster Pack = Magincia, Plus the Magincia Bazaar

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Last week I speculated that maybe the next booster pack would be the graphics update, ala Kingdom Reborn. I said it’s just speculation, and it turned out to be just that.

Tonight the Classic Client was updated to version 7.0.12.1

Over on Stratics, a Stratics mod, Nexus, took a look at the Cliloc differences. A lot was added that deals with what is being called the Magincia Land Lottery, including booster pack references.

I wondered how they would deal with not making it Luna 2 and letting it be overrun with plots that do nothing but serve as vendor platforms. Looks like they are going to have the vendors located in one area, the Magincia Bazaar:

Magincia Bazaar Stall Leasing
Leasing a Magincia Bazaar stall requires purchase of the [Booster Name Here]. Stalls are leased for a period of 7 days. At the time a stall becomes available, the highest bid for that specific stall, or the highest bid for the first available stall (whichever is higher) wins the lease for that stall immediately. The funds for the winning bid are taken up front and there are no refunds. Bazaar stall lease winners will be notified immediately if logged in, or at next login.Each person may have one active bid (per account, not per character) at a time. Anyone may place, retract, or adjust a bid for a stall lease at any time. Funds for bids are held in reserve. Bids may only be funded from checks and gold in the character’s bank box, and all returned bids are delivered to the claimant’s bank box. If a person is currently leasing a bazaar stall, that person may bid on another stall. If that person wins a new stall lease, the current lease is abandoned with no refund and the contents of the old stall are relocated to the new one. The current high bid on the abandoned stall immediately wins, beginning a new 7-day lease. Anyone leasing a stall may place a hidden “match bid” to retain that stall. At the time of lease expiration, if the current highest bid for that stall is equal to or less than the match bid, the match bid wins the auction at the highest bid price and the current lease is extended for another 7 days.The current renter may abandon a stall lease at any time but will not receive a refund. Auction end times are always reported as approximations, and an auction reported as “Up To 6 Hours” may end at any moment. In the case that a stall has no current lease and no bids, the stall’s lease will remain at auction for 12 to 24 hours.

Some notes:
* The Cliloc updates contain quite a bit of information about the planting on Magincia that players will be able to engage in.
* There is also a “chest of sending” that looks to be related to the vendor stall.
* The deed that you can win for to place a plot for Magincia can be used as a recall rune to the exact plot.
* If you don’t place, it spells out that normal housing rules take effect after 30 days, but the deed itself will remain as a souvenir.
* There will be several notices for when the lottery takes place.
* You can get updated odds on winning a plot.
* It looks like more of the Stygian Abyss expansion is being fleshed out. Not sure if it will be Gargoyle-only.
* Arena is definitely coming.

These may also be new items:
* A “Resonant Shield of Vengeance” is being added (Gargoyle-related)
* Lantern of Counselor (Legend) (kind of weird if you think about it, reminding players of the counselor program)
* Wedding Book (self-explanatory)
* Memorial Stone (dedicated to past UO players or to Dawn?)
* The afore-mentioned chest of sending.

I’d like to see more about this mailbox that was mentioned in the House of Commons.

A part of me is slightly disappointed that the next booster is tied to Magincia, since it’s taken so long for them to wrap this up. If they charge for this, it better be really cheap. I don’t know that “New Magincia” is worth the money, but I won’t complain as long as work progresses on other additions, such as the high-resolution artwork. I also question the vendor bazaar – the Luna vendors are liable to dominate it if it comes down to bidding wars.

The devs wanted to roll out the next publish dealing with Magincia in March, and they wanted to go through a full cycle with Origin, so the content contained within this patch will probably be live on the Test Center within the week.