Patch 58 - November 25th 2014, Thanksgiving & Combat Changes

Happy Thanksgiving Renaissance

• Starting Wednesday the 26th strange mounted warriors will be wandering the land.
• Players should take care when encountering these warriors as even their mounts are deadly.
  Wild Turkey
  Savage Turkey
  Bloodthirsty Turkey
  Indian Archer
  Indian Fencer
  Indian Macer
  Indian Knight

Animal Trainer

• The animal trainer will now perform a range check on any stable target to verify that the target is within 15 tiles of the stable master. Thanks Minallee
• This will resolve the bug that was allowing players to travel with a stable target up exceeding the logical range for a stable command.
  For more details see this thread > http://uorforum.com/threads/stable-stall-exploit-extremely-annoying.7260/

Bulk Order Deeds - Rewards

• Converted the Phoenix Armor rewards from the blacksmithing bulk order deeds reward list to a deeded item.
• This will replace the current system of receiving a random piece of armor when turning in a qualifying bulk order deed.
• Given the difficulty in obtaining the armor there is no need for this type of randomization.
• Using the deed and selecting a piece of armor will place that armor piece in your pack. Once you make a selection you cannot undo your choice.
  Note: All existing phoenix armor pieces will be replaced with deeds after the patch is implemented.
  Note: These deeds, like most other rewards, will not be blessed. However Phoenix armor pieces are newbied.
  

Combat - Applied Changes

• Found and resolved a problem that was causing armor to fully absorb all damage from fists (wrestling)
  Note: The damage for fists was 1d8. In situations where you were punching someone with high quality armor the armor was absorbing all of the damage. This problem was caused by a faulty equation that when applied to the minimum damage for fists was resulting in a fraction which was dropped to zero. Combat damage on Renaissance will never be lower than 50% of the weapons minimum damage level when applied to absorption by armor. Fists being the only weapon with "1" as the minimum damage broke this logic and resulted in a zero damage result.
• If you successfully hit another player/monster with your fists the lowest damage you can do now will be 1. Thanks Gen/Pill
  Note: A successfully parried hit can still negate this damage completely.
  Note: These changes are live on test center should players wish to test the effect of this fix on combat/interrupts.

Combat - In Testing

• Weapons have been converted to use dice rolls for determining the damage a weapon does on a succesful swing.
• Information on dice rolls can be found here in our stratics archive.
• To balance the conversion to dice rolls we have adjusted the material and magical bonuses provided by armor to values that are more suitable for our hybrid T2A/UOR point in time.
• Magical armor no longer gives a default +10 base bonus to AR levels.
• The bonus for exceptionally crafted armor has been improved from 8 to 12 AR. This is in line with the data available for exceptionally crafted weapons.
• The material bonuses for leather armor have been adjusted for combat balance.
• The bonus for an exceptional barbed piece of armor before the patch is (8(exceptional) + 16(barbed) = 24; After the patch it would be (12(exceptional) + 6(barbed) = 18;
• The material bonuses for metal armor have been adjusted for combat balance as well.
  Note: Once these changes are tested and verified to improve the quality of combat interactions on the Renaissance server they will be applied to global combat.
  Note: These changes are active only during the Hythloth CTF match and are considered to be "in testing". You can also experience these changes on test center.
  To read more about these changes and see some specific details you can read below or click here.
  To review the changes as they apply to individual pieces of armor we have updated the armor list with the updated data. That information can be found here

Capture the Flag

• Resolved small problem in which in certain situations balance anomalies were still seen
• All CTF teams should balance correctly within +/- 1 player regardless of team loading.
• Fixed a small header issue with the CTF scoreboard gump
• Fixed a bug in the system that balanced 2 team matches that was leftover from balance testing.
• Reduced the flag hold timer from 10 minutes to 5 minutes on a testing basis.
• Players holding the flag will be revealed should they manage to hide themselves by any means.

Commands

• Adjusted the whatisit command to now include the hue of the targeted item.
  

Factions

• Adjusted the faction stat loss timer from 10 minutes to 5 minutes while we look into the problems with temporary stat loss based skill checks.

Guild Alliances

• Completed the implementation of the guild alliance system for pirates/brigands and the undead.
• These NPC's will no longer view players who's guild is allied with their NPC group as enemies.
• Pirates/Brigands in the lost lands will ignore any guild alliance settings however.
• To read more about the Guild Alliance system unique to the Renaissance server click here.

Houses

• Added a "disable courtyard" option to the House Gump - Options section.
• The Disable Courtyard option will allow you to turn off marking and travelling to a houses courtyard to all players.
• This option can only be changed once every 24 hours and affects all players.
• This option, when enabled, treats the courtyard of houses as part of the house with the exception of ban/kick functionality.
  Note: This is in line with a change OSI made in which they added a similar feature, although without the option of turning it off. This feature will be incorporated into the future addition of the moats and bridges which will be added for keeps/castles and forts.
  

Lumberjacking

• Players can now train the lumberjacking skill beyond 65 while sparring with another player or monster.
• After the player hits 65 skill in lumberjacking skill gain will slow down drastically but you will be able to train the skill to grandmaster levels.
• Finishing training the skill on trees will be 5-6x faster than this method.
  Note: This change was made after doing research into the amount of boards generated by our players working lumberjacking. This change will result in less boards hitting the economy thus improving the value of these resources for our gatherers and crafters. While allowing our combat related players to gain the skill without adding wood to the world. (or dealing with our attended verification system).
• The rate at which skill will gain beyond 65 will be adjusted based on additional research and testing.

Mobiles

• Assigned the proper Armor Value to Forest and Desert Ostards (18)
• Assigned the proper armor value to frenzied ostards (30) Thanks Dalavar
• Drakes and Giant Spiders will no longer ignore young player status.
• Drakes and Giant Spiders that spawn on Ocllo will no longer be able to be tamed.
• Strong Mongbats will no longer spawn on Ocllo island.
• Additional spawn will be added to Ocllo island to allow for proper new player level taming training.
• Added loot backpacks to the following creatures: Phoenix, Slime, Lava Snake, Kirin, Rat, Giant Rat Thanks Dalavar
• Added smart pathfinding to the following creatures; Phoenix, Lava Snake, Kirin, Giant Rat Thanks Dalavar
• Pack Instinct has been increased from a range of 1 to a range of 2 tiles around the defender.
• Resolved a problem that would allow players to release an aggressive creature in town even with the current restrictions.

Profile Gump

• Added a direct link to your achievement profile accessible from the profile command.
• Updated some minor wording issues with links/commands.
  

Reporting Murders, Bounty Application

• Revamped the system in which players are presented with and have the option to report a player for murder and place a bounty on their head.
• Re-designed the gump based on examples obtained from the T2A/Early UOR era.
  
• You will only have the option to place a bounty on a murderer if they have more than 4 murder counts and you have at least 1 gold coin in your bank account.
• Implemented a more detailed system of system messages for the victim clearly indicating that they did report the player for the murder along with a clear indication of any bounty that was applied.
  
• You will also be able to see the total bounty for the murderer.
• For more information regarding the murder count/bounty process see this compendium article Murders, Bounties and Counts

Small Bulk Orders

• Small bulk orders will now allow you to target a container of items rather than having to target specific items.
• This does not change the logic of filling a bulk order deed, it will just attempt to add every item in the container that matches the deed.
• Any error messages you would normally see are supressed and instead you will see a count of items added to the bulk order.
• This will work on containers that you have proper access to within 2 tiles of your character.
• Targeting specific items will still function like normal and will be restricted to your backpack.
• Using this new feature you can fill containers in your house with a certain type of item. Say a mix of exceptional and normal plate chests. Targeting the container with the bulk order deed for exceptional plate chests would collect as many matching items that were needed to fill the bod.
  

#UORPvP Alerting

• These alerts will be broadcast in the #UORPvP channel to encourage players to better utilize that irc channel for pvp/unmoderated discussion
• These messages will only show in irc and will have a 5-10 minute delay (on average).
• This will be tested and adjusted based on player feedback.
• When a player places a bounty on another player after being murdered the following message will be broadcast.
  
  Example: "a bounty of {#,###}gp has been placed on {Murderers}'s head! The guards of Britannia will now pay {#,###}gp for their head."​
• When a player turns in the head of another player with a bounty on it
  
  Example: "{Playername} hast brought the infamous {Murderer} to justice! Lord British has rewarded them with a bounty of {#,###}gp"​
  Example: "{Playername} hast brought the minor criminal {Murderer} to justice! Lord British has rewarded them with a paltry bounty of {#,###}gp"​
• When a duel results in a clear winner
  
  Exanple: "{Winner Name} has won a {Type of Duel} by defeating {Loser Name}"​

Website Updates - Log Overhaul

• Replaced the classic original death/kill/pvm logs with a new combined log system.
• Reset all players kill and death log data to private.
• All new characters will be created with these settings set to private as well.
• Implemented new links for the new system.
  http://www.uorenaissance.com/index.php?page=m_player_kills&fn=436571
  http://www.uorenaissance.com/index.php?page=m_player_deaths&fn=436571&sort_id=id-D
  http://www.uorenaissance.com/index.php?page=m_player_mobKills&fn=436571
• Will be replaced with
  http://www.uorenaissance.com/player/log/436571/Kill/50/Date_New
  http://www.uorenaissance.com/player/log/436571/Death/50/Date_New
  http://www.uorenaissance.com/player/log/436571/Monster/0/Type_ASC
• Links will be provided to all 3 pages on the players profiles, however if your kills/death data is private this will be seen.
  
• The player kill/death log has been updated to include new sorting options, and by default will return the first 50 records found matching your selection.
• You can adjust this selection and your sorting option from the main menu.
• A header block was added to show information about the log data being seen along with some quick links.
  
• Examples of the updated death/kill log.
  
• The monster kill log has been optimized to provide a much more responsive experience.
• Adjusted the way monsters are displayed to allow for 4 entries per line.
• Updated all of the monsters names and icons to link to their updated compendium pages.
• Optimized the table structure and indexes of the mob kill data tables to improve the performance of this page.
  
  Note: By setting your show death setting to public players will be able to see your death data.
  Note: By setting your show kills setting to public players will be able to see the monsters and players you kill. You name will show up in players death logs with a link to your profile as well. If this is set to private it will only be listed as "private".
  

Website Updates - New Compendium Articles

• http://www.uorenaissance.com/info/Murder_Counts
• http://www.uorenaissance.com/info/Guild_Alliances
  Wild Turkey
  Savage Turkey
  Bloodthirsty Turkey
  Indian Archer
  Indian Fencer
  Indian Macer
  Indian Knight
  Ore Golem
  Ore Golem Lord

Test Center / Live Server Combat Changes - Testing

Starting with patch 58 we will be experimenting with a few combat changes to address long standing issues with Renaissance combat.

The changes listed here will be applied to test center and linked to the combat log book available in the testing area. The changes also will be implemented on the live server however they will be limited to the trammel facet. This will allow us to use the Hythloth CTF area to perform testing of the new mechanics in a controlled environment.

Should testing go well and the changes improve the balance and quality of Renaissance PvP/PvM the will be enabled on the live server. (In Patch 59)

Dice Rolls

Weapon damage is currently determined by applying a randomizer to the minimum and maximum damage values tied to each weapon. For a halberd this would be a minimum of 5 and a maximum of 49.

Using dice rolls the minimum and maximum would be the same however the method you process the damage roll is different. For a halberd this would be 2 23 sided dice with 3 bonus damage.

Min/Max System: Random(5,49) = damage roll
Dice Based: Random(1,23) + Random(1,23) + 3 = damage roll

These might look similar and you might think they generate similar results however if you run both calculations 10,000 times through a randomizer you will see two drastically different results.
​

Image 1: Min/Max System, Image 2: Dice Based


Graph 1: Min/Max System (10,000 Samples)

Graph 2: Dice Based (10,000 Samples)


Drastically different, however if you look at the total damage done over 10,000 combat hits using either method you come up with the following

Min/Max System: 269,086 (Average Roll 26.9)
Dice Based: 270,074 (Average Roll 27)

So while the distribution of the damage rolls is drastically different the two methods will always return similar total damage over time.

So now lets take a look at a drastically different weapon the War hammer. Unlike the Halberd the war hammer uses 7 dice.

Min/Max System: Random(8,36)
Dice Based: Random(1,5) + Random(1,5) + Random(1,5) + Random(1,5) +Random(1,5) + Random(1,5) +Random(1,5) + 1
​

Image 1: Min/Max System, Image 2: Dice Based


Graph 1: Min/Max System (10,000 Samples)

Graph 2: Dice Based (10,000 Samples)


Given the War Hammers multiple dice and bashing type weapon you are less likely to see a high or low hit and instead will experience a much more normalized damage result. Hits between 15 and 29 damage will be more common, while hits between 8-14, and 30-36 will be more rare.

Armor Properties
In order to balance out the conversion to dice rolls listed above we have to address the issues with magical/material/exceptional properties for armor.

Currently we use the following default RunUO Logic.

Exceptional Armor: + 8 AR
Dull Copper: + 2 AR
Shadow Iron: + 4 AR
Copper: + 6 AR
Bronze: + 8 AR
Gold: + 10 AR
Agapite: + 12 AR
Verite: + 14 AR
Valorite: + 16 AR
Spined : + 10 AR
Horned: + 13 AR
Barbed: + 16 AR
Defense: + 15 AR
Guarding: + 20 AR
Hardening: + 25 AR
Fortification: + 30 AR
Invulnerability: + 35 AR
​

Issues:

Exceptional crafting bonus for armor is to low.
Magical bonuses are inflated by 10 AR
Material bonuses are to inflated as well.​

We have been aware for a while these were overpowered for our point in time however until we addressed some broader issues changing them would be difficult.
The new proposed values are the following.

Exceptional Armor: + 12 AR
Dull Copper: + 1 AR
Shadow Iron: + 2 AR
Copper: + 3 AR
Bronze: + 4 AR
Gold: + 5 AR
Agapite: + 6 AR
Verite: + 7 AR
Valorite: + 8 AR
Spined : + 2 AR
Horned: + 4 AR
Barbed: + 6 AR
Defense: + 5 AR
Guarding: + 10 AR
Hardening: + 15 AR
Fortification: + 20 AR
Invulnerability: + 25 AR
​

This change would also be coupled with addressing some issues with incorrect AR values for individual pieces of armor. The AR change would most likely only affect new armor as older armor would be grandfathered.

Renaissance Compendium: http://www.uorenaissance.com/itemlist/Armor
Renaissance Stratics Archive: http://www.uorenaissance.com/stratics/armor

The changes are as follows;

Bone Armor: Unchanged (30AR)
Chain Armor: 28AR > 23AR
Leather Armor: Unchanged (13AR)
Studded Leather: Unchanged (16AR)
Ringmail: 22AR > 20AR
Plate Armor: 40AR > 30AR​

Other than the processing stress on the website to run 10,000 calculations I can't imagine it being very hard to create a small tool to visualize this.

Basoosh is generally correct, when applied to the relatively new player mindset. one of the first things someone will seek out starting out here is gm crafted weapons/instruments and armor.

The changes go hand in hand with the weapon balance changes Gladiator. While it looks like a big change, in application the difference between the server now, and the server after the changes is minimal. This is why we have taken the trouble to slowly apply these changes to allow players to experience them and realize it provides much more normalized combat experiences vs the erratic damage ranges seen currently.

Keep in mind that we have increased the exceptional bonus by 4AR as well.

The "plan" was to normalize combat, not make any one group experience an increase/decrease in effectiveness. By changing to dice based combat rolls vs purely range randomization armor was rendered even more overpowered than it already was. Changes were made to the material/exceptional/magical bonuses for armor to balance out this change.

If you simply look at the numbers you are missing the whole story. Hop on test center, make two accounts, grab some armor and weapons and try it out. You will be pleasantly surprised.

This change was not based around making magic armor less powerful, dexers more deadly, or leather armor less effective. It is to create a better experience for all our players.
Where use of the right equipment and correct skillset can provide an advantage in combat.


The only major change we foresee is additional value being applied to magic armor/exceptional armor as the material bonuses are now adjusted to a more normal level.