December 22nd Livestream Transcription
– Intrepid Studios shares Alpha 1 progress updates and first look at the new UI changes.
Reminders:
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- Monthly cosmetic swapover (in regards to The Under the Frost items) is scheduled for 13 January 2021, 11AM PST.
- Upcoming Dev. Discussions for next year: Boss Difficulty, Guilds, Daily Login rewards and more.
- Journey to Alpha 1 – Choose your Own Adventure series on Intrepid Studios socials (Twitter, FB, Discord, etc.) will continue next year as well.
Quick Updates:
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- Just wrapped up the Alpha 1 test – huge studio milestone.
- Intrepid Studios will be closing for the remaining 2020 until 4 January 2021.
- An additional hiring round of 30 team members will start from January 2021.
- The next Creative Director’s letter will be around 7 January 2021.
Design (UI) Team Updates:
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- Alpha 1 map size was around 70 km2. Note that this particular map is in the North-West corner of the world of Verra. Total size of Verra is estimated to be 400km2.
- We are moving towards our full dynamic Node system. Each Node will be able to pull from a large number of different layouts that will be available later as the art team creates more (for this test there was only one layout), thus building a character for each Node, as it levels up, by pulling different houses, buildings, and different positions.
- Stream showcase of a 40 minute 4K Boss fight from Alpha 1: https://t.co/ahEkdyDy3M
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- Disclaimer by Steven: This is a work-in-progress and things like the character models, armors, FX, and UI are not finalized. Also, this boss fight is intended for a raid but was fought by a small group, hence the “cheats with GM hacks”.
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- Combat revamp will not be present until “probably” March.
Environment Team Updates: Concept progress of the new Housing Decor Items:
Character Team Updates:
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- In-game model and Creation clip of the Fox of the Pyre cosmetic:
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- Dunir Cloth and Plate armor models:
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- Troll variants:
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- Corvid Castigator cosmetic:
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- Noble Warhorn in T-pose:
QnA Session
Q: In regards to Guild Wars, will Guilds in alliances have the option for permanent or long-lasting wars with other Guilds in alliances or will the Guild Wars system only allow for shorter objective-based conflicts?
A: There won’t be permanent wars. There will be victory conditions applied to each war instance and those will vary across the universe depending on the respective Guild’s levels and assets.
Q: Can we Guild invite across Verra or do characters have to be close to one another?
A: You will be able to invite across Verra either through your Guild interface or a chat command. Same will apply to friend requests.
Q: When you’re adding someone as a friend, are you adding their character or their account?
A: Character. There might be a separate functionality through the website or launcher to add the account, but this has not been determined yet.
Q: What actions can be taken against a vessel of a Node that you declare a war on, eg.: can they be sieged during a Siege period as well?
A: No, Sieges are Node specific. You obtain a declaration item through a quest that is determined by the level of a Node Siege you will be attempting to do; and once you have the item, then you may declare against one specific Node of that questline’s level or lower.
Q: When a Node Siege has been declared, can that Node gain or lose experience during the declaration period and thus advance or attribute to a different stage?
A: The declaration period does not inhibit the Node’s ability to collect experience, mainly because of the time length the declaration period can take (Metropolis is 6 days, City – 5).
Q: Will every race have their own style of combat in terms of animations?
A: We would love t o do something like that, but we would need several hundred animators to make that happen, but there will be racial abilities, which will key into the class you choose. There will be some distinct racial flares, but we will have to re-use the animations as much as possible due to cost and deadlines.
Q: What will death penalties be inside of objective-based events that don’t rely on player-flagging, such as: Caravans, Guild Wars and Node Sieges?
A: There will not be death penalties applied to event-based deaths to encourage more participation in such events.
Q: Will the values of stats on dropped gear be random to some degree for each item, eg.: I get a sword that’s +80 stamina, and then another time the same drop with +93 stamina?
A: Yes. Individual item stats are variable and the degree on which those stats change will indicate the rarity of that item. This applies to the crafting system as well. The mastery level of the particular crafter will impact the crafted item’s stats.
Q: Will there be a different default mount for each race and what might they be?
A: In a way, yes. Each starting area will have a questline that will reward you with a different starting mount. BUT that does not mean you will get a horse if you are a human. You will be able to be a human and choose to start in a different racial area, resulting in you getting a mount of a different race.
You will also be able to change the appearance of your mount’s base skin to something radically different.
Q: Will there be Daily Login rewards?
A: Possibly, yes. They are probably going to be limited monthly cosmetics for collectors. If you log in every day, you will get that cosmetic, if not – then you will never see it again.
Q: In regards to the day-night cycle, when we look up at the stars, will the sky be static every night or will we get to see variation in the night sky?
A: In terms of bang for the buck, it’s not a high priority.
