Vendetta Online Newsletter #2
Posted: Sun May 24, 2009 10:11 pm
Visit http://vendetta-online.com/h/news.html for all the latest VO news and information. Here is the latest official newsletter from the devs.
Quote:
*Top News*: Many updates and changes have happened over the last fewmonths! A few of the most significant:*Multi-player Ships*: Players with Behemoth and Atlas class vessels maynow take several other players onboard, who can help by controllingonboard turrets. Up to four players may share a single Behemoth!Implementing this and working out the inevitable kinks has been a majorstepping stone towards our long-awaited goal of Player Capital Ships.*Dynamic Warfare*: After a lengthy period of testing and tuning, we'verolled out dynamic sector conquest to the Deneb system. The Itani andSerco (and UIT, on either side) are be able to take part in series ofcontinuous weekly battles for territory, with 177 sectors falling to oneside or the other in a bid for the resources of Deneb. Four differenttypes of battles, from fighters-only up to massive fleet engagements,permit varying play styles as well as allowing people with oldercomputers to participate. This new gameplay feature has just beenreleased a few hours ago (Friday); but as ever with softwaredevelopment, unforeseen bugs may yet remain, so we ask for patience withany issues that crop up. Eventually the intention is to roll out thistype of conflict between many of the minor factions in Grayspace,creating a constant flux and a shifting balance of power as regionaldisagreements burst into small-scale Corporate Wars. On top of this, aprivateering system using Letters of Marque will allow players toplunder the convoys and resources of their chosen enemies.*Friendly Fire Restrictions Removed from Gray*: Grayspace is nowentirely without any friendly-fire restrictions, people of the samenation may attack one another at will. Eventually, these restrictionswill also be dropped from most of Nation space, but this is an interimsolution.*Reworked New Player Experience*: New specially-created Training Sectorsand a rewritten tutorial system should provide a smoother introductionfor new players. Training Weapons reduce the chance of player-on-playerinjury, while still permitting PvP training. A new system of TrainingSector, Capitol System and Nation Border defenses create a decreasinglevel of safety as one heads towards the greater risk and rewards ofGrayspace.Changes still in the works:- Major Economic Redux. Among other things, we're refactoring the traderoutes to have the greatest profit tend to be through Grayspace. Tradingin safer locations will still be possible, but with reduced profits.Mining and trading will both be impacted by this, and will play into thegreater "universe redux" which has been cooking for some time.- Universe Redux. We're re-defining the universe with much greaterasteroid densities to better reflect the type of interestingenvironments we would like to have, and also the advancements incomputing performance since our game was released in 2004. As part ofthis, we'll also be re-mapping all the ores and minerals in allasteroids, and creating several new rare types. This re-mapping ofresources will then play a major part in forward-looking Dynamic Warfareas well as the upcoming version of "crafting", which we callManufacturing. Other fun stuff also falls out of this, like thedeprecation of Ion Storms in favor of statically-located foggy "reefs"of asteroid sectors, yielding interesting chokepoints for piracy andwarfare (a few Ion Storms will continue to be scattered around, but willbe much less common).- Event Registration. This new web-based system will allow players toregister times and locations for upcoming Events, as well as requestingGuide involvement if needed. Officially "Approved" Events will then beannounced via a new email list. Special "Event Arenas" are also beingconstructed, allowing players to defend a particular area of territorywhile a player-organized event is run.- Faction System Updates. We're continuing to clean up and improve thefaction system, and the many, many areas of the game that it touches.This includes advancements to friend-or-foe determination on ship radar,improvements standing loss and recovery mechanics, unalignedplayer-characters, and other changes.- Player Owned Stations. Yes, this is still coming, and still quiteimportant to us. We've made a lot of headway on this, and we expect itto play a major part in the "Manufacturing" (crafting) system, as wellas the high-level Trading/Mining endgames. Dynamic Warfare betweenplayer factions in an expanded ring of Grayspace around the existinggalaxy will also hopefully create some fascinating large-scale PvPinteractions, completely driven by players and player-organizations. Onthe more peaceable side, stations will allow players to post missions,which may be fulfilled by either player characters or NPCs; deliveringresources for pure trading, or to be manufactured by expandable stationmodules into other, more refined goods.- Player Owned Capships. As mentioned above, the recent achievement ofmulti-player ships is a major step forward towards implementation ofplayer-owned Capships. We expect player capships to be an important partof our large-scale trading, mining and combat endgames.- Piracy, Pirate Clans, the Return of Bounties. We have a lot going onin these areas. The delineation of Nation Space by defense turrets hastemporarily corralled some of our pirates in Gray, but we intend to givethem a lot of New Stuff To Do, as well as some intriguing new mechanicsfor avoiding the authorities. Most major new content, moving forward,will take place in Grayspace or require some interaction there. There'sa lot to do, but we're looking forward to it.That's all for now, everyone. We hope this message finds you well, andyou're able to stop by and check out some of our recent work!
Quote:
*Top News*: Many updates and changes have happened over the last fewmonths! A few of the most significant:*Multi-player Ships*: Players with Behemoth and Atlas class vessels maynow take several other players onboard, who can help by controllingonboard turrets. Up to four players may share a single Behemoth!Implementing this and working out the inevitable kinks has been a majorstepping stone towards our long-awaited goal of Player Capital Ships.*Dynamic Warfare*: After a lengthy period of testing and tuning, we'verolled out dynamic sector conquest to the Deneb system. The Itani andSerco (and UIT, on either side) are be able to take part in series ofcontinuous weekly battles for territory, with 177 sectors falling to oneside or the other in a bid for the resources of Deneb. Four differenttypes of battles, from fighters-only up to massive fleet engagements,permit varying play styles as well as allowing people with oldercomputers to participate. This new gameplay feature has just beenreleased a few hours ago (Friday); but as ever with softwaredevelopment, unforeseen bugs may yet remain, so we ask for patience withany issues that crop up. Eventually the intention is to roll out thistype of conflict between many of the minor factions in Grayspace,creating a constant flux and a shifting balance of power as regionaldisagreements burst into small-scale Corporate Wars. On top of this, aprivateering system using Letters of Marque will allow players toplunder the convoys and resources of their chosen enemies.*Friendly Fire Restrictions Removed from Gray*: Grayspace is nowentirely without any friendly-fire restrictions, people of the samenation may attack one another at will. Eventually, these restrictionswill also be dropped from most of Nation space, but this is an interimsolution.*Reworked New Player Experience*: New specially-created Training Sectorsand a rewritten tutorial system should provide a smoother introductionfor new players. Training Weapons reduce the chance of player-on-playerinjury, while still permitting PvP training. A new system of TrainingSector, Capitol System and Nation Border defenses create a decreasinglevel of safety as one heads towards the greater risk and rewards ofGrayspace.Changes still in the works:- Major Economic Redux. Among other things, we're refactoring the traderoutes to have the greatest profit tend to be through Grayspace. Tradingin safer locations will still be possible, but with reduced profits.Mining and trading will both be impacted by this, and will play into thegreater "universe redux" which has been cooking for some time.- Universe Redux. We're re-defining the universe with much greaterasteroid densities to better reflect the type of interestingenvironments we would like to have, and also the advancements incomputing performance since our game was released in 2004. As part ofthis, we'll also be re-mapping all the ores and minerals in allasteroids, and creating several new rare types. This re-mapping ofresources will then play a major part in forward-looking Dynamic Warfareas well as the upcoming version of "crafting", which we callManufacturing. Other fun stuff also falls out of this, like thedeprecation of Ion Storms in favor of statically-located foggy "reefs"of asteroid sectors, yielding interesting chokepoints for piracy andwarfare (a few Ion Storms will continue to be scattered around, but willbe much less common).- Event Registration. This new web-based system will allow players toregister times and locations for upcoming Events, as well as requestingGuide involvement if needed. Officially "Approved" Events will then beannounced via a new email list. Special "Event Arenas" are also beingconstructed, allowing players to defend a particular area of territorywhile a player-organized event is run.- Faction System Updates. We're continuing to clean up and improve thefaction system, and the many, many areas of the game that it touches.This includes advancements to friend-or-foe determination on ship radar,improvements standing loss and recovery mechanics, unalignedplayer-characters, and other changes.- Player Owned Stations. Yes, this is still coming, and still quiteimportant to us. We've made a lot of headway on this, and we expect itto play a major part in the "Manufacturing" (crafting) system, as wellas the high-level Trading/Mining endgames. Dynamic Warfare betweenplayer factions in an expanded ring of Grayspace around the existinggalaxy will also hopefully create some fascinating large-scale PvPinteractions, completely driven by players and player-organizations. Onthe more peaceable side, stations will allow players to post missions,which may be fulfilled by either player characters or NPCs; deliveringresources for pure trading, or to be manufactured by expandable stationmodules into other, more refined goods.- Player Owned Capships. As mentioned above, the recent achievement ofmulti-player ships is a major step forward towards implementation ofplayer-owned Capships. We expect player capships to be an important partof our large-scale trading, mining and combat endgames.- Piracy, Pirate Clans, the Return of Bounties. We have a lot going onin these areas. The delineation of Nation Space by defense turrets hastemporarily corralled some of our pirates in Gray, but we intend to givethem a lot of New Stuff To Do, as well as some intriguing new mechanicsfor avoiding the authorities. Most major new content, moving forward,will take place in Grayspace or require some interaction there. There'sa lot to do, but we're looking forward to it.That's all for now, everyone. We hope this message finds you well, andyou're able to stop by and check out some of our recent work!