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Hot off the press! The November Newsletter.

    • 71 posts
    November 14, 2018 2:06 PM PST

    Nanfoodle said: I agree with this. Some group may also not want to stop while you read things. We need an options on this. 

     

    See my earlier reply about this. Tome of Keeping is the answer you're looking for.


    This post was edited by picks86 at November 14, 2018 2:06 PM PST
    • 363 posts
    November 14, 2018 2:45 PM PST

    Like the new characters. Nice update. :D

    • 432 posts
    November 14, 2018 4:11 PM PST

    Strange choice for community relations considering the references . Community relations within SOE were all but non existent and Daybreak was a disaster of major proportions . Unless community is supposed to mean anything with the exception of players that is .

    Sofar I think VR handled the communication with the community quite well and I hope that Pantheon is not going to turn Daybreak style , e.g ignoring everybody and everything , hiding information and never explaining important choices and changes in the game .

    • 624 posts
    November 14, 2018 5:19 PM PST

    I simply loved this newsletter. Thank you VR.

    I eagerly await spending many hours perception pinging, seeking out lore and quests. I still think (nearly three years later) that the Keeper is a bard. I assume Istuulamae wrote the Tales from the Fire: The One Between the Winds...bravo! I really enjoyed the imagery and phrasing. The Children of the Valley. Stormcloth. Onus Kiss. Thaeolyn Greyborn (distant relation of Kaolyen Greyborne? I must discover the connection! Maddeningly mysterious, tantalizingly teasing). Finally, always fun to learn more about a community member like Deadshade / Malloran. I now know which dwarven Master Smith to commission when I seek mythril strings for my lute.

    • 125 posts
    November 14, 2018 5:41 PM PST

    I look at community relations like I look at a human resource manager in business. Having minimal experience with community relations but having extensive experience with human resource having been in senior management positions in several companies with hundreds of associates I can say this... A human resource manager is only as good as the information they are given by senior leadership and what direction has been given to them in disseminating that information. One may question the morality of an individual's choices based on the information they are allowed to address and what knowledge they actually have but unless you have full access to all of the information I feel it is impossible to judge a person's performance in this case.

    I can say this however. The developers of pantheon, so far, have given me very little reason to doubt that they are sincere in their primary goal to make this a mmo based on community and that they value community input. With this being the case I will give them the benefit of the doubt in instances like this until they give me reason not to. I wish her well in her role with pantheon.

    On a side note... I too find the models of the Elf and the Halfling to be very similar. Hopefully as developement progesses these models will evolve as I am sure they will. Great jod on the newsletter as always.


    This post was edited by Aatu at November 14, 2018 5:54 PM PST
    • 3852 posts
    November 15, 2018 5:24 AM PST

    This will get very nasty if real world politics are discussed. Please. Stop.

    I have to say I agree with Deadshade about SoE. 

    But someone can be very nice and very competent and do things they would rather not do because of orders from top management. So while my attitude to SoE remains very Freman-like ("Never to forgive. Never to forget.") I do not assume that means that VR will take the same imperfectly good approach to its community. Very different top management. I blame levels much higher in title and much lower in competence than I assume Linda is.

    It is nice to see a very experienced and high profile acquisition -welcome Linda.

    This may be my favorite newsletter yet and that is a high bar - the last one was excellent. 


    This post was edited by dorotea at November 15, 2018 5:26 AM PST
    • 228 posts
    November 15, 2018 6:23 AM PST

    As always, I enjoyed reading the newsletter. Thank you.

    My favorite part is Joppa's article about Perception. It sounds like something I will be spending a lot of time with. My only reservation is that it sounds like a system better suited for solo play. In a group I fear it could become a nuisance if members frequently stopped to investigate something that the rest of the group had no or little chance of perceiving. But I trust that VR are aware of this and will do their best to solve any such issues.


    This post was edited by Jabir at November 15, 2018 6:24 AM PST
    • 108 posts
    November 15, 2018 8:09 AM PST

    not a fan of the elves at all! The male and female face looks the same. The halfling female looks ok but the head of the male looks wrong perhaps too small not sure. The ogres look good love their facial features. The only criticism i have is their bodies just look human in proportion. how bout broader shoulders and more barrel chested.

    • 8 posts
    November 15, 2018 3:45 PM PST

    Loving the ogre's detail!

    • 2 posts
    November 15, 2018 8:50 PM PST

    So stoked that Brasse is part of the team.  She's the best!

    • 217 posts
    November 16, 2018 3:14 AM PST

    Well let me start with, I loved the perception system break down. Cant wait for more details and to dive into it. 

    Next character models, Ogre as many have said looks great. But... I would challenge anyone who said that to answer this... Do they look like an OGRE? I say nay, pretty to look at yes, polished sure. Ogres???nope, not at all. Half Orcs would be a better racial description.

    Ogres werent broken, they looked the part. They were actually freakin amazing.  Totally understood Skar revamp and ya all explained why and it made total sense. Why are you ditching loads of hours=money retooling gr8 character models.

    Redo the gnomes if anything, they look like bees. Big ol hive of bees, when looked at are pretty much all the same with very few deviations.

    Halflings, why are they trying so hard to make them look like Peter Pans lost boys? Halflings should be more like Frodo.. elves just look like pointy-eared Asians.. should be taller and slender in my opinion. And yes these are my opinions and Im entitled to them so dont flame me.  Just how I see things.

    Appreciate the updates on PA4 and opening for more pledgies to join up. Would be even cooler to know how many anticipated PreAlpha phases there will be and maybe a gues-timate for Alpha.

    Thnx,

    Grumpy Smurf

    • 595 posts
    November 16, 2018 9:21 AM PST

    Cynwulf said:

     The only criticism i have is their bodies just look human in proportion. how bout broader shoulders and more barrel chested.

    VR, please include banana for scale.

     

    vigilantee13 said:

    elves just look like pointy-eared Asians.. 

    As opposed to pointy-eared Caucasians...?

    • 4 posts
    November 16, 2018 2:53 PM PST

    Looks amazing! Looking foward to more screenshots or a stream/video :) Keep up the good work.

    • 217 posts
    November 16, 2018 3:48 PM PST

    Nikademis said:

    Cynwulf said:

     The only criticism i have is their bodies just look human in proportion. how bout broader shoulders and more barrel chested.

    VR, please include banana for scale.

     

    vigilantee13 said:

    elves just look like pointy-eared Asians.. 

    As opposed to pointy-eared Caucasians...?

    No as opposed to pointy eared elves

    • 6 posts
    November 16, 2018 10:56 PM PST

    Deadshade said:

    Strange choice for community relations considering the references . Community relations within SOE were all but non existent and Daybreak was a disaster of major proportions . Unless community is supposed to mean anything with the exception of players that is .

    Sofar I think VR handled the communication with the community quite well and I hope that Pantheon is not going to turn Daybreak style , e.g ignoring everybody and everything , hiding information and never explaining important choices and changes in the game .

     

    So the difference between Brasse and SOE failing were different I think. Brasse was one of the main reasons there was even ever a fanfaire. She was pretty much the only person with any sense of community. The company failed her imo. When Daybreak took over it was one of the first things they completely cut and why there is no more fanfaire or any community relations. 

    • 393 posts
    November 17, 2018 5:05 PM PST

    Thanks for the newsletter!

    I think the Ogres look pretty tight (and I'm not an Ogre player/lover)! Perhaps more umph in the upper body mass but their facial detail and expression are superb! I love the hair on both models too. Also, props to the shield designer! Really like the patina and detail of the shield. The environment in the screenshot looks amazing like so many others. This game is looking so awesome. 

    The halflings are almost there! I think their ears look too much like the elves. My preference would be to see slightly bigger ears on them. More facial detail and/or expression would be welcome too. But they are very much Halflings to my eye.

    I find myself most critical of the elves however. It's in their face; it looks more basic rather than polished, as the Ogre models appear. The skin texture looks, as Mathir mentions, plastic-like. Perhaps it's the time of day or the lighting effect. Certainly hope to see some improvement with the elves here. I was expecting them to be a bit taller as well. I will admit, I'm an elf lover (I'm out of the closet) so I know I'm more partial to them. Funny too, I have rarely found a game that portrayed elves to my preference.

    I know very little about Daybreak Games and how they opperated. Don't need to. But I do want to welcome Linda "The Brasse" Carlson to the team! That's a great cosplay btw. The beard almost fooled me!

    Perception looks good. Thanks for the detailed write-up. 

    Finally enjoyed reading Tales From the Fire. Thanks for the Lore and the story!!!

    Keep up the great work everyone. It really is great to see the updates and changes happening. 

     

     

     


    This post was edited by OakKnower at November 17, 2018 5:05 PM PST
    • 166 posts
    November 18, 2018 2:52 AM PST

            • Accept: If a player accepts the Storyline, the quest will begin and the Perception System will continue hinting at what to do, where to go, what to look for or who to talk to next.

            • Disregard: If a player disregards the Storyline, the Perception messages related to that Storyline will cease and the Storyline will be unavailable.

            • Consider: If a player chooses to consider the Storyline, it will reset the Lore Ping with a slight cooldown before the player can trigger it again. This will give the player time to think before they decide to accept or disregard.

    While on the first read this what I have quoted from the newsletter (I can say yes, I can say no, I can say ask me later) sound good, I think it will lead to some problems and maybe also a lot of work for the community team. At least what I understand when reading this lines.

    The "Consider" option seemst to have no problem, but the "Accept" and especially the "Disregard" option will.

    If I accepted a Storyline and it turns out to be awfully boring for me, I think there will be options to disregard it at the next Perctption Ping or just ignore it on my own.

    The biggest issue is on the "Disregard" option. Maybe someone is new to the game and don't know what he is doing, or somone clicks the wront option by mistake, etc, then the possibility to do this Storyline is gone forever? I already see the mass of support tickets asking the support team to reset this decission for a varity of reasons. Better would be to give the player itself the option to revise this option. Maybe add an disregarded Perception Ping to the Tome of Keeping as well, but just grayed out or somethin like that and then give the player the option to remove this grayed out line from the Tome of Keeping which means, that the trigger is active again.

    • 1247 posts
    November 22, 2018 4:47 AM PST

    Overall, Pantheon is progressing well. But, the Elves look pretty lame in a variety of ways that people have already mentioned. They should be more uniquely & distinctly ‘pointier’ in the eyes, brows, and ears.. & narrower jaws within the archetype that does not resemble humans and ‘certain traits‘ of humans. Variations of Elves are cool but going outside of the archetype doesn’t fit well. Just doesn’t look like an Elf at all - disappointing. The Ogre all of a sudden looks Half-Orcish, not really like an Ogre anymore. Elf is even worse. Just honest feedback. 

    edit: Of what we have seen thus far, this image is the only one that actually looks Elvish. I hope the Elf models go more in the direction of image:

    https://www.pantheonmmo.com/images/elf.png

    Anyway, VR: I realize nothing is final yet, but some of the character/racial models that have been shown just aren’t resonating. One of the reasons, imo, why Classic EQ was so adored is that the races were done very well - fitting in what they actually are instead of being pushed into something they are not (this is especially how the Elves appeared in the newsletter). No reason it can’t be done here. Thanks. 

    I find the choice for community relations somewhat strange myself (great costume though). I guess we’ll see what happens. After this newsletter I’ll be paying more attention to what happens with game development.


    This post was edited by Syrif at November 27, 2018 6:41 AM PST
    • 313 posts
    November 27, 2018 5:39 PM PST

    Hey, just a quick little pet peeve about the formatting of the newsletter: I think the usual convention is to take certain quotes from an article and display them in large text to tease an upcoming section.  But in your newsletter, you're putting the quotes AFTER they appear in the main text.  Why?  We've already read the statement.  It makes no sense!

    • 294 posts
    November 30, 2018 2:29 PM PST

    Simply wonderful. Very much enjoyed everything perception.

    I am that gamer who enjoys spending hours looking behind every tree, overturning every stone, searching the depths of a rocky crag in hopes of discovering the legend of a trinket.