Q/A Tracker

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The Q&A Tracker is a collection of the questions and their answers from released livestreams and other media all in one location for those whom are looking for something specific

For more specific criteria, you can use your browser's find section (tpyically Ctrl+F) to look for more narrow results. Searching for #physics would pick out all the Q&A having to deal with physics, and so on.

Inspired by the Chasing Mark Jacobs Document that collected Q&A from the comments section of the Kickstarter during it's campaign. Special thanks to those individual(s) that put that together.

** Disclaimer ** The questions and answers may be edited to be more concise, terse, and/or to cut out banter or inside jokes. This is done for clarity, and the spirit of the questions and answers will be kept as much as possible. Names are also removed.

Test Table

Testing a sortable table instead.

Date	Source	Category	Question	Answer
11-08-2013	Piercing the Veil #3	Crafters	Q: Will crafters have any defensive/offensive abilities to allow them to run away like big girls rather than being a free kill?	A: There are no ‘free’ lunches, and there shall be no ‘free’ kills! Crafters will have some escape and/or defense mechanisms. We want our crafters to be busy, and part of that means having them in the field at times. By the way, boys run too, I’ve made them do so more than once, in game of course…
01-08-2014	Piercing the Veil #4	Crafting	Q: I noticed the Luri (Luchorpan) had a boon giving them a bonus to crafting shoes, do you plan on having B&Bs for every race that relates to crafting?	A: Not necessarily. There is beauty in asymmetry. Also I would remind players that none of the banes/boons are yet set in stone.
01-16-2014	Piercing the Veil #5	Respec	Q: Will there be ANY allowed respecs after character creation in situations where CSE does not drastically change something?	A: If we need to balance and make major, epic level (we were dumb) changes to a class, yes, we will offer respecs for that. We will likely also have a rather hard-to-earn respec available to players who are unhappy with their current build, yet we are not promising this as of now. We don’t want a steady stream of people respec-ing to the FotM build, so players should not expect to be able to respec frequently.
04-11-2014	Piercing the Veil #7	Magic	Q: Will the overuse of magic in a confined area/battle have possible negative effects on your character/s or their environment?	A: Quite possibly. Remember, the Veil is alive and it’s maybe a bit miffed, what with that whole getting punctured business and all.
10-30-2014	Unveiled Newsletter #3	Abilities	Q: I have a question about how abilities will work. I know you guys talked about it plenty, but I am curious, will the abilities be a predetermined template as in- all viking warriors have the ability Slash!. Without putting any customization into it is a simple auto attack filler type of ability, but with some customization the ability could evolve into a bleed, a leg attack, and disarm, or a charge up burst ability. Or is it where you literally make an ability, with a tool given to the players where the damage is predetermined depending on certain variables. Such as the utility you give the ability, the cast time or cd of the ability, the bonus damage effects, poison/bleed. If this has already been answered could someone let me know? I don't think it has been answered this specifically before (probably because you guys don't know yet!) but if your leaning in a particular direction I would love to hear about it.	A: We are pretty excited about our combat system and the myriad ways you can customize your attacks. We don’t have an auto attack planned, or anything as simple as that! Attacks are broken down into four basic types of ability components; Primary (weapon), Secondary (way to use it like “slash”), and optional Modifiers (such as body target, range, etc.). You can even have Modal Components (like stances), which we haven't talked as much about. This is a pretty complex system! It will be best to give your abilities a lot of thought before you even engage in combat, and consider things like how you like to attack. You will be able to create very specific abilities to match your play style. Customize away!
03-12-2015	Unveiled Newsletter #7	Abilities	Q: Will the fighting system (where you create your own attacks) allow for disastrous results? When working with a more open system, the failures can be very amusing sometimes.	A: One of our Foundational Principles is about this very thing! We do plan to introduce an RNG (random number generator) factor, to introduce both critical successes and critical failures in the game. These special events will be rare, so don’t fret that you will constantly have to worry about a mismanaged spell blowing up every time you inscribe it into your spellbook, or other disasters (and triumphs), unless you court the lady of fate on purpose. ;) As a player, you are in control of this when creating abilities themselves, as you can decide to include a higher volatility attribute. Do that only if you want to embrace that table of possibilities and increase the chances of a success or failure. As MJ has said, “moments of monumental glory discussed as water cooler conversations” make life interesting.
03-12-2015	Unveiled Newsletter #7	Abilities	Q: If ability components are trained individually through use before reaching a soft cap, then how one player choosing to use few different components in order to have a very specialized build/role/style will be rewarded compared to one other player using many of them and be more jack of all trades ? Is there a mechanism that you didn't talk about yet to make this kind of choice matter (see what I did there) or is this a kind of choice that you don't want to support?	A: I did see what you did there, and you hit on the important point! Choice matters in this and everything else. If you want to use fewer components, but focus on soft-capping those limited components for maximum effectiveness, you can certainly do so. You will likely have fewer overall abilities to choose from, however: after all, there are only so many ways you can combine a smaller number of components! OTOH, If you want to diversify and have a lot of everything with various abilities for specific situations, you can do that too. Neither method will put you at a major disadvantage, depending how you play. It is the difference between a specialty focus and a larger toolset, and depends on which serves you better in the situations you engage in.
10-24-2013	Piercing the Veil #2	Cosmetic	Q: Will we be able to hang the heads of our enemies over our gates as a warning to anyone foolish enough to come knocking (read: will there be any sort of decorative battle trophies)?	A: Omg, yes please!!! The truth: I haven’t been in on a conversation about this yet, but I would be very surprised if there hasn’t been one, and further surprised if we did not end up having battle trophies in the game.
10-24-2013	Piercing the Veil #2	Cinematic	Q: Any chance for a time lapse of your VERY talented artist’s creations? I love watching these things.	A: So do we! When I was a kid I sat glued to the TV watching Bob Ross paint for hours :) There is more chance of this for post-launch artwork. Now that we are funded, well, we have a game to make! The artists are most often hard at work on things that aren’t yet revealed. This is not to say it won’t happen. We know how much you guys love it. As I mentioned in the previous PtV, we may livestream for our PayPal relaunch, so perhaps we can work some in then.

Abilities, AIR, and Paths

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#abilities #crafters)

• Q: Will crafters have any defensive/offensive abilities to allow them to run away like big girls rather than being a free kill?
  • A: There are no ‘free’ lunches, and there shall be no ‘free’ kills! Crafters will have some escape and/or defense mechanisms. We want our crafters to be busy, and part of that means having them in the field at times. By the way, boys run too, I’ve made them do so more than once, in game of course…

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#banes and boons #crafting)

• Q: I noticed the Luri (Luchorpan) had a boon giving them a bonus to crafting shoes, do you plan on having B&Bs for every race that relates to crafting?
  • A: Not necessarily. There is beauty in asymmetry. Also I would remind players that none of the banes/boons are yet set in stone.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#respec)

• Q: Will there be ANY allowed respecs after character creation in situations where CSE does not drastically change something?
  • A: If we need to balance and make major, epic level (we were dumb) changes to a class, yes, we will offer respecs for that. We will likely also have a rather hard-to-earn respec available to players who are unhappy with their current build, yet we are not promising this as of now. We don’t want a steady stream of people respec-ing to the FotM build, so players should not expect to be able to respec frequently.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#magic effects #veil)

• Q: Will the overuse of magic in a confined area/battle have possible negative effects on your character/s or their environment?
  • A: Quite possibly. Remember, the Veil is alive and it’s maybe a bit miffed, what with that whole getting punctured business and all.

10-30-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #3 (#ability creation #components)

• Q: I have a question about how abilities will work. I know you guys talked about it plenty, but I am curious, will the abilities be a predetermined template as in- all viking warriors have the ability Slash!. Without putting any customization into it is a simple auto attack filler type of ability, but with some customization the ability could evolve into a bleed, a leg attack, and disarm, or a charge up burst ability. Or is it where you literally make an ability, with a tool given to the players where the damage is predetermined depending on certain variables. Such as the utility you give the ability, the cast time or cd of the ability, the bonus damage effects, poison/bleed. If this has already been answered could someone let me know? I don't think it has been answered this specifically before (probably because you guys don't know yet!) but if your leaning in a particular direction I would love to hear about it.
  • A: We are pretty excited about our combat system and the myriad ways you can customize your attacks. We don’t have an auto attack planned, or anything as simple as that! Attacks are broken down into four basic types of ability components; Primary (weapon), Secondary (way to use it like “slash”), and optional Modifiers (such as body target, range, etc.). You can even have Modal Components (like stances), which we haven't talked as much about. This is a pretty complex system! It will be best to give your abilities a lot of thought before you even engage in combat, and consider things like how you like to attack. You will be able to create very specific abilities to match your play style. Customize away!

3-12-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #7 (#ability creation)

• Q: Will the fighting system (where you create your own attacks) allow for disastrous results? When working with a more open system, the failures can be very amusing sometimes.
  • A: One of our Foundational Principles is about this very thing! We do plan to introduce an RNG (random number generator) factor, to introduce both critical successes and critical failures in the game. These special events will be rare, so don’t fret that you will constantly have to worry about a mismanaged spell blowing up every time you inscribe it into your spellbook, or other disasters (and triumphs), unless you court the lady of fate on purpose. ;) As a player, you are in control of this when creating abilities themselves, as you can decide to include a higher volatility attribute. Do that only if you want to embrace that table of possibilities and increase the chances of a success or failure. As MJ has said, “moments of monumental glory discussed as water cooler conversations” make life interesting.

3-12-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #7 (#ability creation #choice)

• Q: If ability components are trained individually through use before reaching a soft cap, then how one player choosing to use few differents components in order to have a very specialized build/role/style will be rewarded compared to one other player using many of them and be more jack of all trades ? Is there a mechanism that you didn't talk about yet to make this kind of choice matter (see what I did there) or is this a kind of choice that you don't want to support?
  • A: I did see what you did there, and you hit on the important point! Choice matters in this and everything else. If you want to use fewer components, but focus on soft-capping those limited components for maximum effectiveness, you can certainly do so. You will likely have fewer overall abilities to choose from, however: after all, there are only so many ways you can combine a smaller number of components! OTOH, If you want to diversify and have a lot of everything with various abilities for specific situations, you can do that too. Neither method will put you at a major disadvantage, depending how you play. It is the difference between a specialty focus and a larger toolset, and depends on which serves you better in the situations you engage in.

Aesthetic and Art

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#cosmetic)

• Q: Will we be able to hang the heads of our enemies over our gates as a warning to anyone foolish enough to come knocking (read: will there be any sort of decorative battle trophies)?
  • A: Omg, yes please!!! The truth: I haven’t been in on a conversation about this yet, but I would be very surprised if there hasn’t been one, and further surprised if we did not end up having battle trophies in the game.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#cinematic)

• Q: Will we see some parts of Mark’s stories as a Cinematic Intro, or what kind of Intros will we get?
  • A: Not likely. As much as Mark would love to see some of his idears as cinematics, it’s not in the budget for us.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#art #timelapse)

• Q: Any chance for a time lapse of your VERY talented artist’s creations? I love watching these things.
  • A: So do we! When I was a kid I sat glued to the TV watching Bob Ross paint for hours :) There is more chance of this for post-launch artwork. Now that we are funded, well, we have a game to make! The artists are most often hard at work on things that aren’t yet revealed. This is not to say it won’t happen. We know how much you guys love it. As I mentioned in the previous PtV, we may livestream for our PayPal relaunch, so perhaps we can work some in then.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#terrain)

• Q: With such a primary focus on performance, how dense or sparse can we expect environmental vegetation to be?
  • A: Simple, enough vegetation to feel natural, but not so much that it causes a heavy load on the server. What that looks like remains to be seen. We have Andrew Meggs building us a shiney, new, ultra optimized engine, so I think we shall have our cake (trees) and eat it too.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#cosmetic #houses)

• Q: Just about everyone likes rare items, has any thought been put into adding them as hard to get housing decorations or perhaps POI’s for well-established player towns?
  • A: Yes! We love rarity as it adds that uber exciting element of ‘zomgs, I found one!!!’ We plan to have rare and hard-to-obtain items to keep players excited, striving and guessing.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#music)

• Q: How important do you feel that music is to establishing realm identity?
  • A: Very important. I hope we can either get a good, cut-rate score from a young composer or raise additional money so we can afford to go with an experienced team. As many of you know, I’m a huge movie and movie score buff so I relish the opportunity to get something special for Camelot Unchained.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#cosmetic #tattoo)

• Q: Any plans for tattoos beyond the usual ‘pick tattoo, put on armor, never see it again’?
  • A: Indeed! We’ve discussed player designed tattoos and Tim Mills came up with a pretty wicked idea for branding. Not confirming anything, just saying we do in fact have discussions about this and cool things are likely to happen!

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#weapon proc)

• Q: Will I be able to make my weapon glow? Particle effects <3.
  • A: Signs point to yes.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#clothes #cosmetic #crafting)

• Q: Is there going to be items you can dress up in while in your house or not doing battle?
  • A: Crafters are a very important part of our game and we want them to have a staggering diversity of items to craft, so yes, non-stat player clothing is something we plan to implement.

Arms and Armor

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#cloaks #heraldry)

• Q: Many MMORPGs let guilds create heraldry and apply it to tabards and cloaks. Is there a chance of expanding this to other equipment, like shields?
  • A: Quite possibly so. We love the idea of realm and guild pride as well as unique character customization. So there is a chance you will see guild emblems on more than just cloaks. As Mark has said many times, the key is the effect on performance. It may seem trivial, yet when you are looking to have large-scale battles, every little bit helps.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#gear #gear templates)

• Q: I love making gear templates for different classes. It’s fun when there are many important stats (including resists). Unique items and drops ensure that very few people ever have the same exact gear on. How will Camelot Unchained encourage unique template builds?
  • A: Since there won’t be gear drops in our game, all the gear must come from our crafters. They will have the ability to make really powerful, diverse and unique items. Those looking for a WoW (or even DAoC) style system where item bonuses are the key to success (and for the popularity of certain items) will find that this won’t be the case. Gear from our crafters will be useful, though not crucial, in helping the wearer. Mark has spoken about avoiding some of the typical MMO tropes when it comes to gear. He points out that gear is generally used by designers as a carrot to keep players playing (and paying). We won’t rely on such things in Camelot Unchained.

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#gear slots)

• Q: How many gear slots (head, chest, hands, rings, necklace, etc.) will a character have?
  • A: Add feet and wrists for starters and then we’ll see what make sense development wise and for the players. :)

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#weapon switching)

• Q: Will we be entitled to switch weapons without restriction?
  • A: Not a chance. You can switch weapons during combat but it will not be an instant switch with no loss of time/focus. The amount of time/focus may vary but there should be, at a minimum, a slight cost for doing so.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#cloaks)

• Q: Will Camelot Unchained feature hooded cloaks?
  • A: Yes. You are going to sleep like a babe now, aren’t you?!

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#armor #Cait Sith)

• Q: Will Cait Sith wear armor?
  • A: Aye and some will occasionally bristle about it. War and their love for Arthur has led them to do things some swore they would not.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#gear)

• Q: Will any items in the game be bind on pick-up or bind on equip?
  • A: Bind on pick-up does not make good sense for our game given that all but the starter gear will be crafted, rather than dropped. Materials for crafting will not likely be BoP as they will be a resource that can be traded/sold. Bind on equip may be used for some items, yet it is not meant to be a major part of the game’s item system.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#weapon switching)

• Q: How does CSE feel about second weapon sets for CU?
  • A: Since players won’t need to swap out a set for PvE there will be less need for two sets. Although, some players may prefer to have two sets in PvP. These players should be prepared to experience a penalty (time/vulnerability) for swapping out weapon or gear sets while on the field of battle.

11-26-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #4 (#weapons #polearm #spear #shield)

• Q: Will Mark answer questions concerning weapons this time? If so, I´d like to know
• if possible pole arms in CU will be significantly longer than compared to the tiny toothpicks of DAoC;
• if “unusual” weapons like the bardiche are planned;
• if you consider to implement Spear & Shield tanks?
  • A: While I can’t say much on the look of them in Camelot Unchained (as there is no art yet!) we plan to have polearms, and possibly some unusual weapons as well. Keep in mind that all our weapons are somewhat historically based, so don’t expect to be wielding a body-sized 5-piece sword made of comets. However, there will be fantasy elements on display, like lighting your sword on fire! We are looking at things like the guisarme and fachard as possible ideas, so we are keeping our options open and thinking outside the box. In answer to your last question, we would like to implement spear and shield tanks, yes!

Balancing

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#balance)

• Q: What is your personal feeling and experience when balancing a game? Do you get angry at not spotting an overpowered combo or an unloved class? Disappointed? Or just think that it is one of the truths of life “there will be balance patches”? Do you believe that with enough brain power you can get things right?
  • A: No game of this complexity will ever get everything right. Hasn’t happened and will likely never happen even when the day comes that computers design games themselves. I would say though that I am disappointed when I make a mistake of this or any other kind. I’m a lot harder on myself than I am on other people. :)

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#realm balance)

• Q: What mechanisms will be in place to ensure a realm can recover and compete again after being driven back very, very deep into their own territory?
  • A: That is a pretty complicated answer but let’s start with an easier example. Let’s say that the Arthurians are heavily outnumbered by the other two Realms and have been driven all the way back to their main city. First, we will probably have the expected Realm bonuses for the outnumbered Realm. Next, the Veilstorms will probably be triggered to change things up a bit and third, other things will happen in the beleaguered Realm’s territory to give them more of a fighting chance. That’s all I can say for now.

Building and CUBE

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#building)

• Q: Oakblade asked: Will we have complete freedom in how we build in allowable areas?
  • A: This is a tough one. We want to allow players to be ultra creative with their building designs, without having the countryside littered with wood and stone genetalia. Some of you might love to create a giant phallus home in which to mount your battle trophies… For others, that oversized penis-like thing kinda breaks immersion. This issue will require a lot of thought and careful planning! Truth is, to allow the level of creativity we desire, over-sized replicas of organs may not be avoidable, we shall see.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#blueprints #building #houses)

• Q: If a player built house is destroyed/ransacked by the enemy realm, do you envision all contents being destroyed? Or will it be more of a money sink to have to rebuild the house, but items contained within are somehow saved?
  • A: We don’t want folks to feel like they hit a quit point each time they lose a house to their ravenous and ever-present enemies. Blueprints will help with this, yet if someone lost all of their valuables each time their house was raised, that could produce a defeatist attitude. A system where part of a players vault is safe in the Capital city (you must journey there to access it) and part of their storage is in their home and is vulnerable, could work. Even when storing items, choices matter!

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#looting #salvaging)

• Q: Will there be any looting and/or salvaging of destroyed structures?
  • A: During our Kickstarter Mark talked about how players will have a choice in how they approach the destruction of structures. If you go down the ‘burn, baby, burn’ route, there isn’t likely to be very much left for salvage. However, if you choose to try and salvage the house right from the start, picking it apart piece by piece, you will be able to get some materials from it. It’s rather likely that taking the place down stone by stone will take longer, so watch for arrows in the back!

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#building)

• Q: Will crafters be able to architect and build (perhaps as a group) their own walled cities?
  • A: Of effing course!

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#building)

• Q: Will the structure building system allow building below the world terrain?
  • A: Well, this is something the studio has discussed and we do like the idea of players being able to build down, though not too far down because then you are just hiding :p So if we do implement this, players would likely be limited to a floor or so down, essentially the basement level. Could be a good area for setting traps! And, of course, there is The Depths. :)

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#claim #houses #plot)

• Q: Will housing consist of a plot system, claiming a square of land that you can build on, or more of a free form, where you could actually build your own house around someone else’s building?
  • A: In open areas (which will be most of the world) it will more or less be choose your own adventure, with obvious limitations for steep terrain, structures already in place, etc. In the safe zone there will be plots that you can claim/purchase and once you do so, others will not be able to build there while you own it.

1-30-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #6 (#building #CUBE)

• Q Caveat to the following question, so I don't sound like a scrub / WoW player: I know that obvious CSE has limited funding and has only presented the FIRST pass of the building system, so things are expected to be less "nice" looking in the beginning.
• That being said. Should we expect that, in the future, structures created with the building system will be made of cubes a la Minecraft? Or should we expect something with a little more finesse such as what we see in Windborne and Everquest Next? I'm fairly sure this would be preferable to most for immersion / aesthetic purposes, I'm just curious if this is currently a main goal, secondary goal, stretch goal, or unplanned.
  • A: No, it won’t look like Minecraft™ with all squares! Unfortunately, we probably won't be able to provide the graphical fidelity of a game with prefabricated 3D models, but you can definitely expect a lot more than piles of cubes. We are looking for a system that will please those who really enjoy the architecture and creativity of games like Landmark™ and Windborne™.
  • If you take a look at our Kickstarter, you can see an example of a more primitive form of the current building system we're working on. As we get a little further along, you will start to see some of the ways we're making sure structures can look like anything, from simple stone blocks to timber halls, without compromising the capacity for free-form building.
  • Think of it as looking at a grid, where you can fit whole building parts together that are pre-crafted, as long as they fit within allowable areas in the placement system. No floating towers though, real structural stability applies!

4-3-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #8 (#housing)

• Q: What will be the benefits to player housing? Will it be necessary or make gameplay more convenient to own a house? Will it be anything like Archeage's system where you basically NEED a house to do certain things in game?
  • A: Player housing, or as we are saying now, “building”, is one of the perks of having a primarily player-built world! On a grander scale, though, there are a lot of benefits to building structures for defense and logistics, and assaulting and defending player-made buildings is a major focus of RvR gameplay. There are many benefits to owning a house, although it is not a mandatory progression element, and you can choose to roam without one.
  • To go briefly into the advantages, the first one would be storage. During your travels you are going to collect and make many things; weapons you want to hang onto, materials you don’t need to use quite yet, clothing for days when you just want to wear a cloak...many things. Even if you are a very strong giant, you will need a place to put these, so that you you aren’t totally encumbered! Your house is a great place to lock these things up in an area that is more defensible (for your average pack rat). You will have other options, though (bank vaults, for one).
  • There are many other reasons to have a house, as well. Perhaps you want a place to craft and put your Vox Magus, or maybe you just want to help your Realm hold territory by having a base to share with friends that is defensible. Lastly, your house is an expression of you, and can be designed to reflect that aesthetically. However, there’s nothing that says you have to have one, and many folks will no doubt find them unnecessary; owning a house will not be a mandatory prerequisite to play and succeed in the game, not even for Crafters.

Character Creation

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#banes and boons #respec)

• Q: If after launch major changes are made to how a certain race’s boons and banes work for balance reasons, will characters of that race get to respec their boons and banes?
  • A: Yes. We might also allow them a full character respec if the B&B changes were significant enough to warrant it.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#character creation)

• Q: Is there a chance to see a name generator (using names related to the race that we’ll choose) at the creation of our avatar?
  • A: Those are fun, but time and budget shall decide. :)

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#banes and boons)

• Q: Will there be imposed banes on some races: hamadryads burn easily, dvergar sink in water?
  • A: Does a luchorpán lust for gold and have long grabby fingers? While we don’t want to overburden our players with Banes and Boons, each non-human race will certainly have at least one Bane on character creation.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#character creation #paths)

• Q: With the importance of choice in our spec and character development, along with a very limited ability to respec, does CSE have any plans to support an official and robust character builder online (or even in game) to assist in planning?
  • A: We haven’t committed to creating such an application at the present time but I know it is something Mark is a big fan of us doing if we have the time/resources. Personally I am also a fan of letting the community build such tools. There are those who truly enjoy doing so and would happily pass the time nerding out on a tool like this! The Eve Fitting Tool (EFT) comes to mind here.

8-21-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #1 (#banes and boons #gender #races #stats)

• Q: How will every race/gender be different?
  • A: Every Race will have Banes and Boons and Stats. Genders are not confirmed for all races, but those with genders may also have advantages and disad- vantages in character creation that offer further differentiation among the races. In Camelot Unchained, your choice of faction, race, etc., will matter a lot, as there are no mirrored races or classes.

Classes and Races

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#classes)

• Q: Every Class will have different Specs?
  • A: Maybe, sorta, kinda, yes and no :p /dodge! Sorry to be evasive on this one. We have discussed things like: having classes that do one thing very well, or having classes that can be specced multiple ways, as well as having combinations of both. Rest assured that if we went with limited class speccing, we would make up for it by having a greater number of classes than we laid out during the Kickstarter.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#aesthetic #race)

• Q: Will there be a male race that has good abs and runs around shirtless like in the movie 300?
  • A: Gosh, men’s abs are all the rage these days! They have their very own reality TV show now, don’t they? Although we jest, this does bring up a good point. There have been many discussions in the studio and on the forums about character appearance. Really what it boils down to for us is that ‘pretty’ is only entertaining for a short while, so it better have something of substance backing it up. So, while we do want our game to look good, and our players to be able to make characters that are unique and personalized, we will be focusing WAY more on actual game mechanics and performance than avatar sex appeal. Fear not, there will be plenty of avatar customization! We are not fans of boob-sliders, (or ab-sliders for the purposes of this question) but we do want there to be enough be plenty of options for folks to make as pretty or ugly a Dvergr as they see fit. Hmm. Pretty dwarves. Welp, there went my credibility.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#archetype #classes)

• Q: Do you plan to let us choose directly a class like Helbound? Or do we have to choose an archetype like “priest” and then, at a certain level we’ll be able to become a Helbound?
  • A: Currently we don’t plan to use an archetype or class evolution as you lay out. It’s certainly something that we have discussed, but given the limited number of classes we will have at launch, it seems like an unnecessary step.

8-21-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #1 (#classes #races)

• Q: Can every Race be every Class?
  • A: Currently, within a single Realm, every race can be every class. Keep in mind that because there are no mirrored classes, each existing class will be unique and tailored to fit into the lore and theme in keeping with that Realm. In other words, you won’t have a fire-based mage class living peacefully within the Tuatha Dé Danann forests.

8-21-2014 - NUnveiled Newsletter #1 (#classes)

• Q: Will there be the usual trinity of classes?
  • A: In an extended sense, yes. Tanks are not simply meat shields for mitigation as they are in some games, because it’s not all about raiding in a rinse/wash/repeat process trying to get that elusive piece of armor that drops 0.0001% of the time every day but Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday! Healers can diversify, and can be very useful in combat even when they are not simply healing. DPS can experiment with abilities, and they do not need to conform to a norm to be useful in battle.

11-26-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #4 (#race #realm)

• Q: Another question. Do you have any new race ideas in development or for now we’ll stick with these? Is there a possibility for 4th realm in the future? (going way overboard here)
  • A: We certainly do have new race ideas! The best place to look for those is our “Something to Think About” section of the forums. While these are very much still only a possibility for the game, we have some great stories about the Phouka (a horse/man race), and the Veilwalkers (a possible stealth class of mysteriousness). We have also internally discussed the Orcadians (called Orcs by their foes). Mark and Max always have the creative wheels turning. Don’t forget that the Gargoyle, among others, still needs a Becoming story too :) As for a 4th realm, that is a very unlikely addition to the game. You never want to say never around this studio (or in a world where Veilstorms are common), but I wouldn’t expect that manner of change to the game.

12-23-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #5 (#classes #concept #archetype)

• Q: Which classes (actual classes, not archetypes) have been confirmed so far? Everything seems to be a "concept" so far and might be changed. Can we expect some information on the first few classes before Christmas?
  • A: Lets take a look at the word Archetype, because that might help clear up some misconceptions. Among other things, Wikipedia tells us it means “forms which embody the fundamental characteristics of a thing," or a "'pattern,' 'model,' or 'type.'" There will be one archetype per class per realm. Right now we are looking at Mage, Healer, Support, Archer, and Fighter as Archetypes, which typify what we want in our classes without yet having a vision document or specific details of what encompasses them.
  • We have confirmed HelBound as a class, and very recently we revealed the Drengr document, with lots of details on the Viking Warrior class. We also revealed the Path System, which should help clarify some of the directions you can take that Warrior class. It has been a busy and very exciting few months! I am looking forward to our Arthurian Mage vision document, which is likely to be next, for those caster lovers. I know you hate to hear it, but everything is evolving, and will continue to do so until we are satisfied that it is the best fit for the game (and may even evolve after launch, if necessary!). We don’t want to create fully-fleshed, 100% detailed classes (beyond vision documents) until the ability system framework is in place, which you will see in P.A.T. #3.
  • We all want the classes to be cool, and here at CSE we hope you will continue to give feedback that helps us to achieve that!

1-30-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #6 (#character creation #making mistakes #progression)

• Q I'm worried about making bad choices early in the game with my 'main' character. Can you tell us more about how bad early choices can be remedied in the game over time rather than entirely re-rolling a character? What systems are in place to help players either slowly or quickly correct mistakes - or are some mistakes forever?
  • A: I can understand your concern about making careful and thoughtful choices at character creation. After all, that is where you choose your Realm, race, class, Banes and Boons, and primary stats, so it really shapes your character and how you intend to play.
  • We expect a lot of online guides to spring up (especially with what Mark has in mind to encourage that), which will help you and others down the road. Hopefully, with our open UI system, we can even integrate some of those into the in-game character creation! We don’t plan to toss you to the wolves to live with the consequences, at least without information first.
  • Our intention is not to lock you into a choice you will regret, but to give you meaningful and varied options to help make a character uniquely your own. Don’t forget about the Path system. Whatever abilities, weapons, and etc. you choose to use are the ones that increase in effectiveness. If you change your mind about how you want to play, you can alter your actions to reflect what you want and begin to gain proficiency in new abilities. Stats and ability proficiencies develop over the course of your character's lifetime, so you can re-direct that as well. It is a slower way to evolve your character than building it exactly how you want at creation, so it’s definitely worth being mindful at the beginning, to make things simpler. Although Path choice will allow flexibility in certain things, some choices are forever, like Realm, race, and class!

Communication, Groups and Guilds

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#alliances)

• Q: Will guilds be able to form formal alliances with other guilds in order to share communications and resources?
  • A: Do I blow a cute fuse each and every time I see a baby duck? YES! We absolutely want our players to be able to create formal alliances. I was in a rather small guild in Dark Age of Camelot, and being part of an alliance made for much easier group finding as well as intel and resource sharing. So, if Mark said no to alliances he would have to deal with some pretty epic pouting…from me.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#8man)

• Q: I personally loved the 8 man groups in DAoC, how large do you see the groups being in CU?
  • A: We are still discussing group size but are comfortable saying that we too like 8 and think it could work in Camelot Unchained.

10-30-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #3 (#small group #against the zerg)

• Q: Are there plans in place to promote small man action (4-5 man) instead of a mindless zerg, going keep to keep, dominating everything by shear numbers? If so, can you elaborate?
  • A: When you play Camelot Unchained, if the only successful way to enjoy yourself is to join a large zerg, or wait and hope that more players log on so you can enjoy our content, we will have failed miserably as a development team. There are obviously various times of day on a server where the populations could encourage zerg-based play, but we hope that won’t happen often. This is why we are designing Camelot Unchained to have enough “carrots and sticks” so that zerg-based play won’t be the most efficient way for players to succeed in our game. The key for us is to have goal-based gameplay, with enough options that are spread around the map, which will reward the Realm that competes smarter using smaller, coordinated groups. Smaller groups will also have CC options which will enable them to have a chance against a larger group, should they encounter one as they to look for resources, scout the land, or escort crafters/caravans safely to a destination, to name just a few examples. Solo play also won't require you to just spend all your time seeking another player to fight. The point is, no matter how you want to play, Camelot Unchained should enable players to find meaningful things to do in an RvR setting without having to resort to “zerging for profit."

12-23-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #5 (#chat)

• Q: Could be a really stupid question* #8: There will possibly be a global/realm/island/region chats for players realm coordination? If not, why not? -- And what about custom chats groups?
  • A: Chat is a very flexible thing, and will be very customizable. Realm chat currently exists in the P.A.T.s, as well as global chat, but this will be expanding for the final game. There might not be pre-built global chat but you will be able to form your own channels for small groups, regions, friends, or whatever strikes your fancy to enable you to have multiple ways of interacting socially. Of course, this is strictly within your own Realm ;)
  • As for chat outside the game, you might already be a part of our Trillian/Pidgin XMPP chat, which right now is for Internal testers but will be open to all players eventually. This is what you see on the front page of our website! You will be able to log in to those “out-of-game chat channels” as yourself and as your character for “in-game chat” when you are actually playing the game.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#crafting #socialization)

• Q: How do you envision customers with very stringent requirements effectively communicating those requirements to crafters/builders?
  • A: Just like they did in the olden days, by talking to one another :) Crazy, I know…but then look who we have leading us :p /duck! In all sincerity, we are super interested in fostering community and as part of that, we seek to encourage relationships between Crafters and their patrons. We want you to remember that kick ass sword Sir Soandso made for you and the timely manner in which he delivered it to your door so that you were able to plunge it deep into the belly of the beast that slew your comrade in The Depths™ last eve.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#caps #guilds)

• Q: Do you believe in placing limits on the number of members in guilds?
  • A: The maximum size of guilds has not been determined yet. One of the things we’ve seen in other games is that too often, a couple of very powerful guilds come to dominate a server. While we do expect to have large guilds, we’re pretty sure that having guilds that can grow to any size is not going to happen.

Control, Land and Map

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#map #world)

• Q: Do you have any idea of what the world will look like?
  • A: Many, you should see our dry erase boards here! Ideas are not something this team is lacking. It’s rather like our confection situation actually. :) There is nothing congealed enough to bite into yet however. As you know, Mark has said that this will be a large world, and while the art team ready the throwing daggers every time he mentions that, we do all agree that we are better off with a map that is maybe a bit too large rather than one that has people feeling crammed in.

10-30-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #3 (#islands #terrain)

• Q: With the world broken into many islands, will individual islands be large enough to naturally and reasonably support an interesting variety of sweeping terrain features such as rivers, mountains, deserts, wild dense forests?
  • A: Very much so. Islands have varying sizes, and keep in mind they don't always stay disconnected. They come together into larger land masses that will feel more like continents, or break back down into islands again as stabilizers are built and destroyed. There will be a variety of experiences in terms of traversing distance by land and sea. Terrain is an important feature, and really shows off the different climates that the Realms prefer. You could almost say that the Realms create their own environments...hmm ;)

5-1-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #9 (#community #control #islands)

• Q: In a territory control game like this, there is a potential to have communities that are in essence built around a geographic location, such as a single island. How are you planning on using game features to support or break down this kind of localized community?
  • A: Good question! In my opinion, the very basis of how community will form in the game is completely based on locality. On one of the islands of your Realm, you have your castle or city, your home, or your guildhall and much more, which are going to be central locations where you patrol, socialize, retreat to, craft, and keep your stuff. Allowing players to build and take personal ownership and responsibility for different parts of the world is something we definitely support.
  • I would imagine that people will have preferences in the area they want to roam, and will build nearby in order to keep close to these places. People will start to think of a certain place as their “home base.” That is not to say that you won’t explore or help out your Realmmates to raid objectives and defend outside of this territory, but travel will be a consideration in such a large world, and it will take time.
  • Even if you are a “lone wolf,” you will likely still have favorite areas where you will often see those who play consistently at the same time of day in your primary regional area, be it forest or mountain range. Say hi to them or, if they’re from an opposing Realm...hit them with a weapon!

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#map size

1. system of measurement)

• Q: How big is the RvRvR-zone going to be in kilometers/miles?
  • A: Since it doesn’t exist yet, we would be speculating. Mark has said the RvR portion of the world is not only going to be big, it is going to make up the vast majority of the world’s map!

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#map #world #zones)

• Q: Is the RvR open world planned to be broken down into zones, or will it be a seamless world?
  • A: We want to go for as seamless as possible. In general Mark is not a fan of instances, and the rest of us here agree. However, if the world map evolves in a way that makes it more interesting to have zones, not instances, we won’t hesitate to use zones.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#NPC #world)

• Q: The Nuada story mentions villages and people all around the land. Does this mean the world will already have NPC villages when the game starts?
  • A: There will of course be the starter cities. We don’t currently have plans for other, satellite NPC-populated cities at this time. We favor the idea of players creating the world outside of the starting zones. Remember, there is a lot that happens between the end of Nuada’s tale and the world the players are in now.

Crafting

3-12-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #7 (#building #crafting #decay #gear)

• Q: With the January 30th Afternoon Update, it was stated in point 7 that "Nothing lasts forever", in relation to crafting. What does this mean? Are we going to have to recreate certain pieces of armor? Or can we just repair them? Do they have a timer in which they'll just disappear after a certain amount of time? What's the extent of this rule, is it just limited to player gear, or does it also apply to castle walls, gates, etc?
  • A: When we say nothing lasts forever, we mean just that! As you use weapons and armor their durability will wane, based on the frequency and the way you use them. Are you attacking with a weapon that has a high fracture rate, and are you hitting it against heavy metal armor? It will likely wear down faster than if you were using it against a light armor wearer. When that happens, you will want to do some basic repairs on your low level armor/weapon yourself with popcorn crafting. When things need a more practiced touch or you have a special piece, you will want to take it to a dedicated Crafter instead. Eventually, some things break beyond repair, but can still be salvaged into component parts to be reforged with new materials, as a part of something new in the circle of Crafting. *cue Lion King music* You can salvage other items in the building/crafting system as well, so think bigger than just fighting gear. In this way, we keep the economy moving forward and allow for continual interaction between Crafters and Fighters.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#banes and boons #crafting #gear)

• Q: Do you plan to give Equipment & Material also a sort of Banes & Boons system to add depth into the choice of equipment, so there isn’t the overall truly best type of armor or the best material, but maybe the best for my play-style? Like iron plate armor gives a +xx resistance for slice and earth-element but also suffers from -xx resistance to blunt and lightning, as an example.
  • A: Absolutely. We want crafting to be as dynamic and interesting as possible and having that level of diversity in terms of advantages and disadvantages, is at the heart of what we believe will be fun for our players. We want Crafters to feel that they can really put their mark on what they make. The more options we can give them to do so, the greater sense of ownership and pride they are likely to have in what they craft and sell.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#cosmetic #dye)

• Q: Once a dye is applied to an item, will it fade over time and have to be re-applied later?
  • A: It’s possible that dyes will fade with time and use though that hasn’t been decided yet. There may also be permanent and non-permanent dying processes that the Crafters can master.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#siege)

• Q: Are rams , trebs , and other siege equipment gonna be movable or stationary?
  • A: Depends. How much can you carry? J Is the equipment already constructed? Are you Schmendrick the spindly-armed caster, or Brutus McTankyPants? You are a hero of your realm and this is a world where magic is alive and thriving, so your limits will be beyond real life limits, yet not so far beyond them that it’s just easy mode.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#crafters #stats)

• Q: Need crafters to use something like endurance to build things, or “just” material and time (and obviously skill)?
  • A: The crafting system is still being designed, and our current thinking is that we may need to use some stat that serves to keep Crafter progression in line with that of non-crafters.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#map #non-mirrored)

• Q: Will the land/zone maps be mirrored in size and shape, or will they be truly unique?
  • A: Tough to say much about these yet as maps have not been created, but we, as always, lean away from mirrored and toward unique.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#non-mirrored #resources)

• Q: Will the same resources be scarce for every realm or will there be differences? E.g. the TDD have much copper in their lands and the Arthurians have much iron, so what is scarce for one is abundant for the other.
  • A: Mark has a heavy bias toward diversity, so it seems likely the Realms will have varying/dynamic scarcities in resources, and that those could change over time.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#gathering)

• Q: Will every tree in the game be harvestable, or only a select few? or will we have to build something like a logging camp nearby to harvest certain areas?
  • A: Not every tree will be harvestable, some will exist solely for environmental enhancement. There has been talk of a dynamic system such that resources ‘react’ to player harvesting by depopulating and perhaps shifting to a new area. Logging camps would fail in such a system. We don’t want the standard respawn node X minutes after harvest, rinse/repeat mechanic seen in most games. Discussions will continue, but expect the unexpected. There has also been talk of trees going through stages of growth. None of this is confirmed of course. Also, keep in mind that the effect of Veilstorms on an area can be important.

Development and Testing

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#Becoming #forums)

• Q: Did you get any ideas from this forum that you are going to put into the game?
  • A: Mark has said that the Becoming™ tale for the Bean Sidhe was inspired by a couple of questions from the forums. We believe that it’s extremely likely that Founders are going to come up with interesting ideas for us to incorporate over the lifetime of the game. As a matter of fact, Mark has a reward system that we will talk about in a future PtV. Mark would say it is ‘an oldie but a goodie’.

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#forums)

• Q: Are you planning to organize the forums with structured / moderated questions and topics or are you happy to keep it as it is?
  • A: Definitely planning a re-org of the forums. As we say, it’s on the list. We’ve had a lot of feedback asking for a simpler design and once we port over to our own hosting, we will have far greater control over the set-up, mods (the code kind), etc., and we do plan to simplify some. We are also planning to have localized subsections of the forums for our communities that prefer to read/write in languages other than English, provided there is enough interest, and so far there is from at least three non-English reading/writing communities.

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#livestream)

• Q: When will the next 24-hour live stream be?
  • A: We are considering having one for the re-launch of Paypal tiers later this Fall! This time we will be prepared, as opposed to the big guy strolling in here and suggesting, “Hey we should stay up for the last 24 hours of the Kickstarter!” At which point everyone wishes they hadn’t stayed up quite so late gaming the night before. I am sure most of you can relate.

10-11-2013 -Piercing the Veil #1 (#magic system #tech)

• Q: Mark recently finished a document on the magic system, which he said was then discussed amongst the group at CSE. How much of it survived the group contact? Specifically Andrew, who would be making tech decisions.
  • A: Our programming team was so on board with the Magic Systems doc, that they started suggesting embellishments and talked about how it would work, rather than how it couldn’t. They are good at life. :)
  • We were all excited actually and the whole team had questions and suggestions. It was inspiring! I think Mark was rather pleased with our reaction to his ‘idears’. In all fairness, Mark usually spends a lot of time talking about his system ideas with the team before he works on the design docs, just to get our initial feedback and suggestions.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#advertisement)

• Q: How will CU reach out to all the possible niche players? Will we see ads and banners, or will it be purely on word of mouth?
  • A: We are a niche game as you mention, so I wouldn’t expect to see much in the way of standard ads and banners from us. Mark tells me: “We will do the same sort of stuff we did back when Mythic was developing Dark Age of Camelot. Lots of viral stuff spread out over the next two years should work well for us. If we are more successful at launch than we expect to be, that’s one thing, but we need to spend our money wisely and on the game’s development.”

11-8-2013 - PPiercing the Veil #3 (#IT #testing)

• Q: What do you envision the first round of internal testing to look like?
  • A: Think Smackhammer with a 60,000 mile tune-up. Runs smoother, but you couldn’t say quite why. Plenty of non-visually glamorous improvements. We warned folks, IT is necessary, but perhaps not all that exciting. The main goal of our initial IT is to see how the new server performs with a lot of living, breathing players beating on each other with sticks.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#conventions)

• Q: Any plans for CSE to attend any game exhibitions like Gamescom or PAX? If not next year maybe 2015?
  • A: Sure thing! Although, that is not in the budget at present. We need to focus on making a great game and then we can consider hosting an exhibition at a convention closer to launch.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#forums #support)

• Q: Will you put stuff in the game that has minority support in the forums if you feel there is a good reason?
  • A: Only a small minority of our Founders are, as expected, regular participants on the forums. So the question becomes whether we would put something in the game if there were internal support for it, even if some or most of the people on the forums state that they are against it. The answer is yes. Our job is to make a great game. Even if some of our Founders don’t agree with the decision, we’ll implement something if we believe it is in the best interest of the game.

11-8-2013 -Piercing the Veil #3 (#goals #IT)

• Q: How are your overall goals progressing and do you think that internal testing will still be around same time estimated before?
  • A: Our goals are progressing well and we do hope to keep our January 2014 schedule for internal testing.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#IT)

• Q: Can you comment at all on bringing active posters into Internal Testing as was mentioned in the Kickstarter campaign? How many additional people will you bring in? Will they come in the first wave, or subsequent waves? etc.
  • A: While we can’t say if this will happen for the first wave of internal testing, it will happen. As to how many, that will depend on need. Certain things we test will require a mass of willing bodies, so when we get to that stage we will be looking to our active posters for their support.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#devs #hiring)

• Q: Can we expect any new members to CSE in the near future?
  • A: Yup! We are working on it. We are interviewing some promising programming candidates at the moment. We still need to add a lot of new talent to our merry band, so if you know any programmers who want a shot at working on a very cool project and don’t mind being underpaid for their efforts (at least until the game ships), let them know about us!

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#physical copies)

• Q: Will CU ever see the stores or will it only be available for digital download?
  • A: We will have boxed copies of the game for collectors. We will likely avoid brick and mortar stores due to the cost of producing the box as well as the cut that would have to be paid to distributor/stores.

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#livestream #media)

• Q: Are you going to make decisions during the development of the game to make it more enjoyable to watch for a third person (like youtube videos, or streams)?
  • A: You may have heard Mark’s BSC idea during the Kickstarter about letting players observe the goings-on in The Depths, when they are not able to be physically in there. We still love that idea and though The Depths are not guaranteed for launch, we remain hopeful about implementing something like MJ’s BSC idea. ** note: Check out BSC Days

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#development process)

• Q: I would be interested to know how to deal with requests, suggestions of Backers when the percentage is very high because many have the same desires and suggestions for the implementation of the game, but opposite to the ideas of Mark because his concept of making the game looks different. How do you deal with such a weighting to Backer’s wishes vs. Mark / concepts / visions etc.?
  • A: The first thing to remember is that this game is not being designed by a committee of Founders/Builders/etc., nor of a committee composed of Founders + CSE. We’ve been very open about a lot of the game’s design, whether through my Foundational Principles, KS updates or other posts. These are things that we feel very strongly about and that were talked about in our KS. Even if a lot/most of our Founders wanted us to change some of them, we wouldn’t do it because they asked; we’d only do it if we were both sure that it made the game better and that these changes wouldn’t break a FP/promise to our backers. Also, keep in mind that I talk about all the key concepts and designs within the studio (for both feedback and a sanity check) before I talk about it with our players.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#DAoC)

• Q: Do you ever feel constrained by the legacy of Dark Age of Camelot during development? Do you ever feel concerned about breaking away from how it did things?
  • A: Hmm, how about every day when I see people saying things like “Just do it the way Dark Age of Camelot did it” or something like that. As we said during the Kickstarter, this is not Dark Age of Camelot 2, it is it’s own game. We intend to make a great RvR-focused game that uses, at its core, some of the same public domain legends/stories/tales that influenced us during the development of that great game but we will not be bound by that legacy.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#multi-game worlds)

• Q: Do you believe multi-game MMO worlds, like EvE’s Dust and possibly Valkyrie, will be the future of the genre? Is this something you have considered for CU?
  • A: I pitched EA a couple of concepts around multi-platform games seven years ago and I do think that there is a place for those kind of games today and going forward. I don’t think they are “the” future for the genre but I do think that they could be “a” future. As to Camelot Unchained, I’d love to see us release bits of the game on other platforms but as of now we have no plans to do XBox One and/or PS4 ports of the game.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#criticism)

• Q: How much rage do you expect from people when you’ll make hard decisions for the game in the future (for example: you leave out certain races from the game or even a whole mechanic altogether)?
  • A: Rage is something that is always associated with MMORPGs whether from the players or devs side. I remember the furor whether it was with the cutting out of some of the cities with WAR, or WoW’s last minute changes right before launch. We hope that by setting the expectations lower for this game (fewer races, classes at launch) we won’t have much to cut and thereby limit the power rage of players. :) We have been and will also continue to be incredibly pro-active in terms of talking to our Founders/Builders during the development process so there should be fewer negative, last-minute surprises than most other MMORPGs experience during development. That is one of the perks of not being part of a large and/or publicly traded company, we can talk about anything we want to without worrying about somebody higher up the food chain calling out for my (or other person’s) head for speaking out about things ahead of time either due to concerns from Investor Relations or just the usual chain-of-command stuff.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#concept)

• Q: What has been the most difficult challenge in designing Camelot Unchained thus far? What part of the design has been easier than expected?
  • A: The most difficult challenge is paring down our many ideas to what we can actually afford to create with our time and resources :) The easy part? Coming up with awesome ideas! This is something Mark excels at. The rest of our team have their fair share of fun ideas too. As you doubtless have noticed, the forums are positively overflowing with them as well.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#game name)

• Q: When will the real name of the game be announced?
  • A: It is likely we will announce the final game name when we launch the new website. First though, we re-open PayPal funding this month with the Builders Tiers!

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#Alpha #IT)

• Q: Does the Alpha testing mean you get in, in January? Or is January IT?
  • A: January is Internal Testing (IT) only. Alpha testing is estimated to open to backers in 8-21-2014.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#hand holding)

• Q: I see Founders invoking FP #3 “no hand holding” against all sorts of ideas that I don’t think it applies to such as dual targeting, health bars for enemies, a progress bar or other indicators for an interrupt timer, and more. Can you further clarify what types of user interface features you would exclude because they are considered hand holding?
  • A: We’ve all seen classic hand holding; the large yellow question mark above a quest-giver’s head, followed by the sparkly trail leading you by the nose to the 10 glowing mushrooms you need to collect. Classic hand holding, right? That example is obvious, yet hand-holding can be somewhat subjective. A wallop over the head for you could be a whisper to the next guy. That’s where Mark comes in. He has a sharp mind for this and will be making the final calls. An example: A player must have some way of knowing when that spell she fired on her enemy is through making him suffer, so obvious visual effects are helpful here and would not be considered hand holding. In summary, there is some grey area and I don’t have details at present about the exact indicators etc. we will implement, but I believe we can safely rely on Mark’s judgment.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#forums)

• Q: Are you happy with the level of involvement of the founders? (not talking about quality, but rather number of Founders active on the forums). When reading player suggestions for CU, do you often /facepalm?
  • A: We are thrilled with the level of involvement from Founder’s. It is right where we expected it to be given the number of Founders. We have yet to facepalm at Founder’s suggestions. Their banter causes the occasional /facepalm however. :p

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#game rating)

• Q: What is the PG rating going to be, if known yet?
  • A: Unknown at present. While Mark would prefer a darker feel and a more serious rating for the game, we have to consider our fans in some European countries. As a result, we will be dark, yet not too terribly graphic.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#herald)

• Q Will there be a stats portal, top 100 dmg dealer, top 100 realm point earner … etc.?
  • A Yes.

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#dev #hiring)

• Q: How is your recruiting drive going?
  • A: We are based out of northern Virginia (NOVA) and pay peanuts, so it’s going about how we expected. We are unrelenting, and hopeful though! We will get the team we need together, even if it takes us a little longer than we like to get them here. Rest assured, you’ll get our best effort whether we are 13 people or 25 people (though we would prefer 25).

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#Beta)

• Q: Will there likely be an open beta before release? I have a feeling that open betas increasingly unpopular were with time, although it constantly gives ugly bugs in the releases that you previously uncovered with a broad mass of players in no time and would have been resolved. Backer and The Pre-Orderer are simply not to be compared with such a player tide. … and yes, there will be bugs again – no question Nevertheless, one could avoid the really big mistake in release order, I think.
  • A: I expect that we will have a limited Open Beta of some sort. We don’t have the resources to have a large-scale OB but we will certainly open up the game to more players than just our Founders/Builders and their beta invites.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#innovation #old school)

• Q: how do you go about creating meaningful innovations and/or refinement in your game design? Most of the Olden Gods of Game Design seem to struggle with this (all the Peter M, Sid M, Chris R, Lord B, etc..) as they either keep rehashing the same formulas or try doing innovation just for the sake of it? How do you keep your feet on the ground and make sure that what you come up with is actually fun, makes sense and is not the same old with better Fx? (and no you can’t answer: I use the Founders)
  • A: Keeping my feet on the ground is easy these days as I no longer have the very limited jumping ability I did when I played ball back in my youth. :) As to being sure that what I come up with is fun, there is no way other than to play the game and have other people play the game. I’m always looking for good ideas (besides my own) from within the team or outside, from our Backers (sorry).

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#criticism #Kickstarter)

• Q: Did you get any negative or cynical comments or responses after the kickstarter?
  • A: Yep, still do occasionally, not at all surprising or upsetting though and I’m used to it. Sometimes it happens on Massively, sometimes on Facebook and I can just imagine what’s being said about me in other places. :) I’ll just stick to what we are doing here whether it is in terms of game development or communication with our Backers and let both of them be the yardstick that I and CSE can be measured against.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#metrics)

• Q: Will you be instrumenting the code to collect statistics on combat (damage done, time stunned, whatever, by class and ability used and so on)? I’d feel better if game balance decisions were based on “real” world performance in game, as opposed to how stuff works in theory, or anything said on the forums!
  • A: Getting a proper metrics tool for Camelot Unchained is incredibly important for us and we need to have it in place when alpha-testing begins. We didn’t have one during the development of Dark Age of Camelot and the one we had for WAR was really helpful at times (other than the parts that were broken).

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#inspiration)

• Q: What inspired you to do what you do? can you define a single moment? Life is good when you love what you do, and do what you love.
  • A: I agree. The single most life-changing moment for me was when I was still in college and I was in the basement of my then-girlfriend’s house in Rochester and I was reading a Time magazine article about the year’s coolest Christmas gifts and in the list was Dungeons and Dragons. The writer described it as something like “one particularly indecipherable game called Dungeons and Dragons.” After reading that I headed to the local store, bought the game and my life’s focus began to change after that.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#crafting #testing)

• Q: Is there a target time for crafters to create items or objects that you can share with us?
  • A: This will be highly variable depending on item type, item quality, scarcity of resources, and Crafter skill. We can’t therefore give any meaningful target time for this.

9-25-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #2 (#discussion #forums)

• Q: When will we see a new approach to board discussions at large? To clarify, more dev-driven discussions with hard, important Q&A, and less non-stop speculation run amok? Just one or two topics a week would be awesome.
  • A: At this point in development, you can see from our PAT checklist that we're pretty full up on things to work on, so there isn't a whole lot of new “something to think about” forum feedback we're trying to gather for now. Once we get our checklist finished and start running more frequent tests, you can expect more surveys and a higher frequency of directed forum discussions. We need the ability to modify/test things on our end without committing to something now that ends up needing to change. That said, I am already planning some other forms of sharing that might satisfy your hunger for dev info! Also, keep in mind that as we get closer to Alpha, there will be more discussions started by our developers in the Something to Think About (StTA) threads.

9-25-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #2 (#IT #off-hours)

• Q: For people that play odd hours, (outside the daytime EST) yet have lots of time, when do you think, or do you think, we could be an asset to do IT? Or, when do you think semi- or round-the-clock IT testing could be done? (question applies to when client is up, of course).
  • A: We are really appreciative of those who are in IT right now, or have been from the beginning! For now, ideal candidates are those who can come into the client during business hours EDT to do impromptu tests on-demand when we need a quick response. However, the servers are open to IT just about 24 hours a day, so there’s testing going on all the time, and they are always jumping on to help out as their schedule allows.

9-25-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #2 (#forums #features)

• Q: Do you keep a running list of the forum ideas that you think have potential to be implemented in the game? Would we ever be able to see/discuss such a list?
  • A: I would say that the forum ideas inspire internal conversation when the topic is timely to what we are working on at the moment. We have a search feature, and a very deliberately designed forum, so our developers can go right to the current or old areas they want to see when those systems start being actively designed. As to the second part about such a list or conversation, no way! :P

10-30-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #3 (#spell effects #PAT)

• Q: n addition to fireball effects that have already been touted, what other cool spell effects might we see planned (estimated, no promises and such) for pre-alpha testing?
  • A: Good question! You have seen the fire dart, earth dart, and water dart effects in some of our screenshots on the website. I highly recommend that you look below at the screenshot of our night battles, where you can see a kaleidoscope of color and shooting particle effects, all done by Mike Crossmire. It is a beautiful and deadly vision of color, as casting, healing, and combat all show off for you visually. One of my favorite effects is the healing fountain, which throws sparkling green tendrils into the air in a circle of aoe healing. In our Tech Central section, you can see a huge wall of water, towering in front of the Viking fighter archetype of the Frost Giant. There are a firewall and earthwall in the current build as well. When you see a St’rm raise her hand and a massive inferno appears in front of you, remember the phrase “don’t stand in the fire”!

12-23-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #5 (#servers #client)

• Q: How long does it take to build whole client & server (Rebuild all on "All.sln")? Do you use unit testing to test elementary things?
  • A: It takes about 6 or 7 minutes to rebuild with speed! As for your question about unit testing, we don’t, actually. The process has a bit more redundancy, to make sure things are thoroughly checked. The programming team is a very cohesive unit that works as a whole organism, geared toward building the game. After our programmers finish coding, we test in the office, after which each programmer submits code reviews of their work to get feedback from each other and streamline things. After the reviews, the code is submitted to our cutting-edge test build on the Hatchery server, where we get feedback from our Internal testers, any final bugs are corrected, and finally it is put into Wyrmling for all of the Community!

1-30-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #6 (#concept #old school)

• Q How do you reconcile the concepts of having an "old-school" feel in certain aspects, as touched on in the Foundational Principles, with systems that seem original or do not fit the traditional concept of what "old-school" is, such as various BSC ideas never done before?
  • A: When we talk about an “old-school” game, we might mean “well before MMOs even existed,” in the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons tabletop dice-rolling era, or the era where MUDS reigned supreme, if you were talking about computer games. These tabletop mechanics and the method of meaningful character creation aren't traditional in modern MMOs. Modifiers, player position, critical successes and failures, skill checks. and etc... these are all very old-school mechanics.
  • While we don’t use all the exact features of every old-school game, the philosophy of challenging mechanics that offer the opportunity for endless creativity in personal story and gameplay innovation are a powerful mix; one which we are also trying to achieve. Some of the best parts of D&D are the strange twists in how players use abilities to have the most epic battles in endlessly inventive ways. We think BSC and old school are the perfect mates! Keep in mind that during the Kickstarter, we said “Camelot Unchained will draw a lot of inspiration from “old-school” games and MMORPGs while also mixing in some new features,” so we think we are doing just that.

4-3-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #8 (#PAT)

• Q: Will there be a PAT-like checklist on the road to Beta?
  • A: There will be. We want you to keep abreast of our milestones in an understandable way, so we are going to put out a checklist that is similar in some ways, but ultimately very different from what we used during the P.A.T.s What will it look like? Well, stay tuned for an update from Mark that will explain it in elaborate detail (warning: puns incoming, I'm sure!) in the near future...(should be very soon, but no promises, its been a busy week here for Mark). ** note: the user stories was this upcoming feature.

6-30-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #11 (#bugs #testing)

• Q: What is your favorite bug this month?
  • A: My personal favorite was when the bots encountered an error on death that caused them to restore to full health, become invulnerable and (thankfully) non-aggressive, in a rebellious act of insolence toward Programmer Tim.

Expansions, Funding, and Stretch Goals

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#funding)

• Q: How will up-scaling a pledge work?
  • A: Like magic of course! Our programming team is working on this now; we will have actual answers for you at the end of the month when we hope to reopen Paypal with fresh tiers. I like saying ‘fresh tiers’.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#cash shop)

• Q: Are their any thoughts on an in game cash shop? And what kinds of things you might sell there such as pets?
  • A: Absolutely, Mark has a lot of thoughts on in-game cash shops within a subscription game (even if the price is below average). Unfortunately, none of them are suitable for printing here. I shall summarize for you though, “BLEEP, and BLEEPING, BLEEEEEPITY BLEEEP!” :)

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#stretch goals)

• A: The upcoming second round of funding will be added to the KS funding toward reaching the stretch goals? If yes, will there be new stretch goals?
  • A: At first, additional funds will go toward existing unmet stretch goals (The Depths!). After that, we will add other super awesome gameplay-related stretch goals that will add a lot to our game. In addition, we will add team members (by dumping water on the existing ones of course), and likely incorporate ideas that we would otherwise not be able to include with current resources.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#investing)

• Q: About the Middle Eastern investors, what were the strings attached that made you reject their offer? Were they in purely from a ROI perspective or did they want to influence the development?
  • A: Initially they were interested in a straight investment deal. As the talks progressed, their focus seemed to shift more to a move of the studio to their country and/or me spending a lot more time there than here. The first part came with a stunning amount of personal gain for me but both carried too much risk for CU as well as potential losses among our team so I had to decline the first part. It’s a shame, I really liked them, their country, etc., and I think we could have done a lot of interesting things together but among the things I said to them was that I had 15K+ Founders who backed CU and I can’t do anything that could put this project at risk.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#Kickstarter)

• Q: Were you surprised and/or concerned by the fact the CU Kickstarter raised such a high percentage of its money from high dollar tiers and that there weren’t more people donating at the $50 or less tiers?
  • A: A little surprised but it was mostly a pleasant surprise. I did expect a higher turnout with a smaller average spend but I’m not at all unhappy at how things worked out. Given the relatively disappointing performance of most MMORPGs (in terms of sales/subs) over the last six+ years, raising 2M+ for an RvR-only MMORPG is a nice accomplishment. Over the next two years as Camelot Unchained evolves we will get a lot more backers in the $50 and below tiers.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#funding)

• Q: Additionally to another round of crowdfunding, would you consider crowd investing for CSE, too?
  • A: Crowd investing is a great idea but given some of the things that the SEC are considering doing to both the concept of crowdfunding and/or crowd investing, I’m not sure how much longer either are going to be truly viable.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#discussions #IT #testing)

• Q: In the future (Post launch) do you plan to maintain us as founders for advice on the game and for the purpose of internally testing future expansions and classes just like we are being utilized for the game pre-launch?
  • A: Absolutely. We’re in this together, both for the short- and long-term.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#investing)

• Q: Just don’t understand the Middle Eastern Investors, If they actually paid attention to the Web casts and such they would of known your stance on this game, why invite you out to their country and make an offer…. Let alone why would you go??? Oooh shiny Jet let me ride it?
  • A: As to why I would go? Simple, part of my job as President is to investigate interesting opportunities for the studio. I think that they thought it could be a great way for them to not only make an investment in the studio but also that I could work with them in their country as well. I just couldn’t afford to take the amount of time away from the studio here that would have been required, plus, I think that the amount of time that they wanted from me grew as we got to know each other better. As far as flying on their private jet, I fly commercial, never have flown on a private jet and don’t have any real interest in doing so.

11-26-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #4 (#tshirts #funding)

• Q: Once CSE begins selling physical items via the store like T-shirts, will the profit from selling those items count towards the stretch goals? For example, if you sell a T-shirt for $20 and profit $5 from that, will that $5 go towards the funding tracker?
  • A: Mark has said from the beginning of the Kickstarter days that a portion of the profits from the T-shirts, and other unnamed physical items, will go towards developing the game. The rest of the profit will help us continue to make more T-shirts (and any other cool swag that might happen), as well as help us handle returns or other unexpected expenses regarding the store. I’m hoping for a Dragonwhale plushie myself, though I think I’m alone in that wish.

12-23-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #5 (#extender pack #expansion)

• Q: What is CSE's current vision of an "extender pack"? Why is it being used instead of "expansion"? I ask because I am looking at getting all "expansions" for free by purchasing it with my founders' points. I am curious if they are the same thing or something completely separate.
  • A: This is a good question, and one we haven't gone into much detail about. Extender Packs are additions to Camelot Unchained that add to the experience of playing, and are free to all who are paying a subscription already. We want to make sure you get all the new goodies as we make more, and as a thank you for supporting us each month. What will they be? New weapon types, new path options for classes? We can’t say, yet.
  • Expansions are a different thing altogether. Expansions are new content to the game that supplements or are an addition to the game on a larger scale. These represent a significant amount of time and/or resources from our team to create, and will have an additional cost associated with them, which we will do our best to price attractively.
  • We always have to be mindful of how this will impact the balance of the game for those who choose not to get the expansion. All of this will be considered before we undertake any expansions. One thing at a time, let’s worry about launch first!

Fun

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#ducks #fun)

• Q: Are there any live Ducks near the office and do you feed them?
  • A: You wouldn’t want to feed the ducks around here. These are some severely jaded ducks. They eat a mixture of buffalo chicken wings and asphalt, and they actually experience road rage. We prefer our ducks bright yellow and plastic, with their innocence still intact.

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#ducks #food)

• Q: Have you ever eaten DUCK????
  • A: Umm. I umm. You see, what happened was…well, it kinda flew into my mouth… OKAY!? It also just happened to be dead, nicely crisped and covered in an amazing orange demi-glaze. As for the rest of the team, they have informed me that during the Kickstarter, some kind Founders sent over some Peking Duck for lunch. They report that it was yummy!

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#forums #fun)

• Q: Do you like lurking in the forums?
  • A: I prefer to call it prowling, but yes I actually do enjoy it :) I would have been doing it whether Mark hired me or not. Hmm, I maybe I shouldn’t tell him that.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#realm)

• Q: When CU finally launches what faction do any of the CSE team hope to play primarily?
  • A: As my British friend Adam would say, “why, you cheeky little monkey!” Would that we could tell you my friend. I can say, that from an informal survey, it seems pretty evenly divided here in the studio. It’s clear that we won’t all be on one big happy team :) I mean, we are essentially daytime roommates right? So there is likely to be plenty of, ‘drink the last of the milk will you!?’ type rage that we feel the need to exact upon each other. Also, as you know, many of us are/were DAoC players (and creators) and so, we have our allegiances. Some folks are saying they will play multiple realms. MJ feels (and I agree) that if we tell players exactly what each of us will play, there is too much potential for players to feel that we favor one faction over the other.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#Phooka)

• Q: Have you ever tasted Phooka meat? Or horse meat as the nearest comparable thing?
  • A: Umm, clearly you’ve never tried to catch a Phouka! **A: All you end up ‘catching’ are flailing hooves in your teeth. We won’t eat horse meat, for personal reasons. My personal reason is that their noses are sooo soft.

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#fun #PvP)

• Q: Which CSE employee is the most feared in PvP? Which CSE employee is most feared on Monday morning?
  • A: Hmm, feared in PvP depends on the genre. Many of us game nightly, so we can hold our own, myself included. Tim would likely be the biggest threat in classic MMORGP-style PvP. James, and Patrick would be rather feared in space PvP. Since we are all over 12, not a one of us is a major threat in any FPS PvP. Feared on Monday morning? Whoever stayed up the latest (being awesome at PvP) Sunday night :)

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#fun #!doctor)

• Q: Do you guys follow Dr Who? If yes, will you watch the 50th anniversary with Hurt, 10th and 11th?
  • A: Many of us do and yes we watched it! Mark recorded it so that we could watch it in comfort in his home theater last weekend. Local places sold out fast and we were all more interested in comfort anyway. A good time was had by all!

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#devs)

• Q: Is it possible to get a picture of our super-duper CSE staff all together?
  • A: You flatter us! What a fine idea though :) I will work on this before Christmas and get a nice shot of us all together.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#ducks)

• Q: If you implement the ducks, they are just a private joke with the community now or have a role in game (food, farming, target training …)?
  • A: I think that one of the few things that the three Realms of this world may agree on is that ducks need to be protected and not used as a food source. :)

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#memories)

• Q: What has been your most memorable experience so far with the CU project?
  • A: This is an easy one, the moment we funded and when the KS closed. We were all pretty excited here and when Andrew took the mic and said all those really nice things about me during the LiveStream I was taken by surprise and unbelievably happy. It was a really emotional moment for me considering that Andrew is quite a genuine person so I know that he meant every word that he said.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#devs #fun)

• Q: Guinness asked: Which Dev can hold their Breath the longest?
  • A: I held a contest. It’s Cory!

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#Imperator)

• Q: Were you the one who came up with the BSC idea for Imperator aka “Romans in Space”?
  • A: That’s on me, 100%. I still believe that Imperator could be a have a fine MMORPG, especially given the subscriber expectations at the time I came up with the idea. It might still sound crazy to some but when we postponed Imperator we got a lot of negative feedback from doing so. It really was a shame, I had a totally cool backstory that I never got to talk about which explained how the Roman republic was saved and how Imperial rule was abolished. Defiantly one of my finest plot twists as it was based almost entirely on fact with only a little bit of fiction thrown in to make it happen. :)

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#pie)

• Q: What flavor of pie would you prefer to be thrown at you by the Dragonwhale backers?
  • A: Blueberry, cherry and Boston cream in that order.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#friars #fun #werebear)

• Q: What are you going to do to ensure that Arthurian Werebear Paladins and Arthurian Werebear Friars aren’t OP?
  • A: We are open to suggestions on this one. They’ve already taken over the studio, drunk all our soda and have peed the perimeter.

Game Features

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#music)

• Q: Will we be able to swap out the music files like we could in DAoC? I loved being able to swap out the 2 default combat musics to my own choices.
  • A: We haven’t discussed this before today but I believe that we will give players the ability to do so!

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#system of measurement)

• Q: If you use a system of measurement in the game, will you use the imperial system, the metric system or a custom made system?
  • A: Apparently you’ve never heard of the ‘rubber ducky’ system of measurement? In all honestly this has not been talked about yet…

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#day cycles #seasons #veil)

• Q: Has there been any thought yet on seasons and day/night cycles? Is there room to break away from typical Earth norms? I’m curious what sorts of impact the veil could have on seasons and what potential impact that could have on gameplay/strategies/crafting. As a simple “off the top of my head” example, perhaps in a certain season some rivers become poisonous due to the oils of nearby plants. Or may in some regions a season cause a near continuous thick fog severely limiting visibility.
  • A: Yes, there have been many conversations here in the studio surrounding day/night cycles, weather, seasonal influences on game play, veil influences on game play etc. Day and night cycles for the game are confirmed. In addition, we have a lot of other cool ideas (and backers do as well!), yet we need to find that sweet spot where we implement just enough of them to keep people engaged and entertained, without feeling overwhelmed or worse, frustrated.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#sound)

• Q: Have you considered the use of 3D sound and bind-able, per-recorded sound bites for the characters (“Help me!”), allowing you to identify the direction from which the plea for help is coming from?
  • A: No, we haven’t considered this yet.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#blood #game rating)

• Q: Will there be blood spatter during combat?
  • A: Not bloody likely. Sorry, sorry, couldn’t resist. It’s not that we are particularly for or against it, but we are hyper focused on performance here. While things like spell effects are needed, blood spatter is not and therefore would be an unnecessary load on servers. However it’s possible that there may be a call for a bleed animation in response to a certain attack/spell. There’s also the issue with blood/gore in some EU countries so we want to be careful here.

11-8-2013 - Piercing the Veil #3 (#emotes)

• Q: Will /dance and other silly emotes make it into the game?
  • A: So although MJ is weary of /dance himself (can we blame the fella?), it’s likely we will have a variety of emotes to allow characters to express themselves.

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#combat system #magic system)

• Q: Can you give out accurate information on the magic system? If not, when can we expect a more profound explanation of combat systems and rules?
  • A: Mark has been writing and editing the magic and combat systems documents and we have had team meetings to give him feedback. Once we have these systems to a point where the team feels that they are exciting and workable, then we can start releasing details to the community. Once these systems are polished enough for a reveal, we will happily (yet with a modicum of trepidation!) do so.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#/face #/stick)

• Q: Will there be /face /stick, etc.? If not decided, which way are you leaning?
  • A: I suppose I need to talk about this at some point so I might as well say something now. My personal feeling is that we shouldn’t have them in the game but I really want to get feedback from our Founders/Builders about this. Again, this is just my personal feeling and like many things in Camelot Unchained, I’m not going to implement it just because I feel a certain way.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#aging)

• Q: Can we get some more detail on what aging does to our characters?
  • A: <Mark bravely walks into the lion’s den.> “Back in the WAR development days I thought that having our characters age and show the effects of aging would be a great thing. I had a feature like that in one of my MUDs and I believed it was time for that to happen in one of my MMOs. Unfortunately, even though that was a planned feature for the game, when it came time to implement it, I was told that we couldn’t do it for a variety of reasons, both technical and production-wise. When I told this story to Andrew a few weeks ago, his reaction was ‘Why didn’t anyone ask me? We can so do that!’ Now, even though that pissed me off a lot (because obviously NOBODY had bothered to ask Andrew before telling me we couldn’t do it and therefore yours truly had more than a little egg on his face with the players), I still like the idea and I asked him whether we could do this for Camelot Unchained. I laid out what I thought was a reasonable way to do this and he said that was a good plan and even easier to implement than what we planned for WAR. So, I’m happy to say that yes, certain races (I won’t commit to all of them yet) will have meaningful changes happen to them; both cosmetic and gameplay. For example, our Dvergr might have more stone covering their body and their beards will grow. Other examples could be with our HelBound’s faces, Hamadryad’s tails, etc.”

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#magic system)

• Q: If the BSC magic system in general and illusion in particular work out as currently planned, could I / we put a spell on my house / our town, so it appears as if it was just a tree / hill or something else that just blends in with the environment to enemy realms?
  • A: Potentially, but boy, would that cost ya!

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#player looting)

• Q: Will there be any looting from killed players? Maybe not everything they were wearing/carrying, but say one random item/money amount?
  • A: Mark has been clear that this is not a FFA looting game yet he wants death to have some sting. The exact mechanisms for player looting is something that we will work with the players on, after Mark presents his BSC idea for certain aspects of the looting, experience gain, etc. systems.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#cooperative effect)

• Q: Will there be the possibility of combined catapulted? Will there be mass incantation or more?
  • A: If by this you mean, is it possible that two or more players can work together to achieve a certain effect within the game, the answer is yes.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#traps)

• Q: During the presentation of The Depths, you mentioned the presence of traps created by players. Is it the same on the outside of the depths?
  • A: Yes. We need to keep our crafters engaged in the game and not just by making armor, weapons, etc. Adding the ability to make traps that can be used by themselves or players anywhere in the world would be a nice addition to the game and for crafters.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#buff #debuff)

• Q: Will the buffs and debuffs be separated on the screen or smashed together in confusion like in DAOC?
  • A: Hopefully our UI will have advanced a bit since the old days at Mythic. If not, well, I think tar and feathers are in order.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#easter eggs)

• A: Companies like Pixar put easter eggs from previous films in future films. Mythic did something similar by adding a hidden alb zone in Warhammer Online. Will CSE add any easter eggs from March on Oz in CU?
  • A: I’m a big fan of good Easter Eggs and I’ve always pushed for that type of stuff whenever possible. I suspect we will have some fun stuff in Camelot Unchained too!

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#weather)

• Q: The weather does affect the vision of the character and the distance spells (in times of heavy rain or fog for example).
  • A: If we implement a robust weather system, as we hope to, then yes, I think that weather should affect combat.

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#heraldry #standards)

• Q: Will Guild Tabards / Standards be something we can carry into a fight? If so will they be lootable / collectable so I can line the walls of my house, with the Tabards of my enemies?!
  • A: Yes, there will be guild standards/tabards that players can proudly carry into battle. Just keep in mind that it may end up in the halls of your enemy if you aren’t too careful!

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#events)

• Q: Rilos also asked: Is there going to be dev player events on occasion in Camelot Unchained?
  • A: Heck yeah!!!

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#banks #storage)

• Q: Can we expect large personal vaults/banks that we can expand by purchasing slots using in-game currency?
  • A: We do plan on having expandable storage for your gear and resources, and yes, in-game currency and perhaps even the help of a friendly Crafter will be needed to procure such inventory expansions. Mark has confirmed that inventory bag/vault management due to number/size of bags will not be as important as it is in many other MMORPGs.

4-3-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #8 (#water #feature)

• Q: Any chance we can get a glimpse of in-game water within the next 6 months?
  • A: We are really excited to get a chance to try out Nvidia Gameworks Turf Effects and WaveWorks, to really add some beauty to the terrain and water elements. As always, we have to make sure that we maximize performance and playability first, but I think you will now start to see more focus on the “pretties” in the next few months! We are really “looking” forward to it!

5-1-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #9 (#affinity #effects #buffs #debuffs)

• Q. Ben has mentioned Affinity a couple of times and how it is used to limit the number of effects on a character at any one time. Can you delve a little more into how Affinity is likely to work, as well as the design decisions around limiting the number of effects that can be on a character at a time and how Affinity is likely to be beneficial to the game?
  • A: Affinity is defined as “the maximum amount of magical power of effects a player character can have applied to them at the same time.” Affinity helps to reduce down the number of buffs players will feel they need in order to feel like they can effectively engage in combat and the amount of information that must be conveyed to adequately communicate a player’s status, so that you can focus on your character and your playing environment.
  • This means that you will be able to easily see and understand the limited visual cues that you recognize of players around you (as well as show your own), and react appropriately without having to look at a long bar of icons for each of your opponents, wear sunglasses as tons of over the top effects overlap on a player into an indistinguishable mess, or guess due to a lack of clear the situational information.

Gameplay

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#casters #AOE)

• Q: We speak about mages with PBAoE. Can you to be sure that each realm will have a PBAoE mage?
  • A: As Mark has stated, we will not have mirrored classes in Camelot Unchained. It would make our lives easier if we planned to have them, but we aren’t going for easy, we are going for awesome. PBAoE spells can be quite powerful and we would have to think very carefully about giving that type of ability to only one or two realms.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#solo)

• Q: If none of my friends or guildmates were online and I wanted to run around solo in RVR territory looking for Pick-up Groups, would I stand a chance at surviving or would that just be a death wish?
  • A: Mark himself often favors solo play, so I would be pretty darn surprised if we didn’t have some classes that were viable and even dangerous on their own, when played skillfully.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#content #time to action)

• Q: How easily do you envision it to be to jump into the action? If I only have 1 hour per day to play the game what percentage of the content will I be able to enjoy? What sort of content will likely be reserved to those sinking 4+ hours per day?
  • A: Ideally any time you hop in, whether it’s for 30 mins or 4 hours, you will be able to accomplish something. Perhaps you hop in and craft something for a short while, or you take an hour to go throw sand in your enemy’s eye and smash their favorite toys. We are aware that some people don’t have as much time to game as they’d like to, and we shall endeavor to provide access to that feeling of accomplishment for these folks too. Heck, you can be of service to your realm even if you just pop on for half an hour and craft potions for them, or scout a bit. Of course the longer you are on, the more noobs you can kill.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#logistics #siege)

• Q: Are there any plans or ideas to include the concepts of supply and attrition in siege warfare (limited supplies for armies on both sides, cutting off supply lines, providing economic or logistical ways to take down an enemy structure, etc.)?
  • A: All kinds of plans for supply lines and siege warfare are being talked about, none cooked enough yet to serve up though.

2-14-2014 - Piercing the Veil #6 (#time to kill)

• Q: What is your target for time to kill, while I know this varies by class comparisons as you are going for hard counters I was wondering if you had a ballpark figure. Personally I would like to see something longer as opposed to shorter.
  • A: This is a rather loaded question and a lot factors into this. For instance, clearly some characters will be far more vulnerable (lower HP and resists) than others. I can at least say this, we are not over fond of insta-gibbing. We want battles to be hard fought, with plenty of give and take. We will seek that sweet spot somewhere between ‘omg die already!’ and POOF insta-dead.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#siege)

• Q: In some games, attacking and defending a fortified position leaves classes without ranged prowess feeling a bit useless. How do you intend to ensure classes without any ranged attacks, or at most poor ranged attacks, can contribute in sieges?
  • A: Launch them via catapult? We’ll see what we can do so the poor, weak, defenseless tanks have something fun to do during sieges. :)

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#solo)

• Q: It was previously mentioned that solo play should and will be a viable option in CU. How are you going to make it happen?
  • A: Mark is a fan of solo play. So, while we can’t describe actual mechanics/details at present, I feel confident saying solo play will be a viable option for those who prefer that playstyle.

8-21-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #1 (#gameplay #friendly fire)

• Q: Will there be friendly fire?
  • A: In certain very specific instances, yes, maybe, or perhaps no. In some open combat that could be a positive dynamic, but inside a city or keep it could be more problematic than fun. We will see what fits best to maximize that fun and avoid griefing. Please keep in mind that FF is not confirmed and even if it makes the cut, it will be highly limited.

Lore

10-11-2013 - Piercing the Veil #1 (#realms)

• Q: Are “Arthurians”, “Tuatha de Dannan”, and “Vikings” the final names for the 3 realms or could those change before release?
  • A: These are not yet set in stone! I am on a steady diet of Founders’ thoughts and opinions, and this topic is no exception. I distil down what you folks say into a readily digestible formula for the team to consume (even though many of them are happily active and/or lurking on the forums). Fun Fact: Mark was originally going to use “Sidhe” instead of “Tuatha de Dannan” but he thought “Tuatha de Dannan” just sounded cooler.

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#aesthetic #Becoming #lore)

• Q: Will it all be this dark? Or will there be some hope and light? I’m not all about puffy unicorn ducks with rainbow wings. But must we have a world that is so extremely dismal?
  • A: Such a timely question good sir! Why just this day I am editing a lighter Becoming™ tale that the boss sent my way. See, what happened was, he was at his desk, channeling H.P. Lovecraft and writing all of these dark, dark things, when all of a sudden, the clouds outside cleared and a bright rainbow did appear! So bright in fact that it blew the blinds clear off the windows and shone straight into his eyes! The rainbow’s essence then entered his very soul and he was possessed to write this tale. It is rather uplifting, not Disney mind, yet light-hearted enough for a puffy-unicorn-duck-with-rainbow-wings to happily digest :) You won’t have to wait long to read it. It will be part of our next Camelot Unchained sprint. So, yes, although we are making a horror genre game, there will be light, for what is darkness without it?

10-24-2013 - Piercing the Veil #2 (#Becoming #lore)

• Q: How will the lore of Camelot Unchained be communicated within the game world in light of the absence of the typical PvE channels such as quests and NPCs?
  • A: This will be done through out-of-game devices such as the Becoming™ tales as well as such in-game items such as libraries and hopefully, our take on a ToK-like instrument.

11-26-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #4 (#lore)

• Q: I’m quite the lore buff myself, and would like to see a page on the website that teases some of the different areas you guys have planned for the game (concept art in all its’ glory). Would you consider creating a page like this?
  • A: I’m going to tease you by mentioning our P.A.T.s checklist, which is more tech-related in general, but includes several vision documents that are being written for classes and character models. Notice that we are focused on character art right now, and less on environmental art during our Pre-Alpha Testing. However, one day, when it’s time for us to work on environmental art, I’m sure Tyler could be bribed into sharing something. We do have a wallpaper, fan art, and a concept art section on the website for you to indulge in!

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#lore #mordred)

• Q: According to trusty Wikipedia, Medraut is Welsh for Mordred. Will this character make further appearances in the Lore as a Mordred-like character, or is he just a one-off character for the sake of exposition?
  • A: Anything is possible.

1-8-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 (#timeline)

• Q: What century will CU be set in?
  • A: That would be telling. :)

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#lore)

• Q: MJ how did you become enthralled in Arthurian Lore and that which surrounds it, be it Celtic or Nordic/Viking? Have you done a degree in history or literature? Or just an interest that sparked as a kid? Or did you have a mentor figure that told you of stories/myths? Or just a movie/book buff like some of us?
  • A: My first influence was my mom as she pointed me to a number of Arthurian books that captured my interest as a youth. That, plus my love for film meant that I was destined to continue to be enthralled by this kind of stuff forever. In college, I met Professor Locke at the University of Rochester and his classes about mythology, legends and Jungian interpretation of the same, just lit a real fire under me. Plus, I was always interested in history, mythology, etc. So, when D&D came out, well, the outcome was reasonably predictable.

1-30-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #6 (#dragons #Vikings)

• Q: Do the dragons hold a grudge against the Vikings? Being they're the only realm strong enough to have killed one?
  • A: Sigurd seems pretty proud of that dragon head at the top of his throne, doesn't he? What tale is to be told, and whether it will echo the classic tale of Fafnir, remains to be seen in the Becoming™ Stories of the future. I can say, however, that you should be on the lookout for a revised and edited release of the Úlfhéðnar Becoming Story below. Don’t let the other Realms hear that the Vikings are the strongest, or more than dragons might be a concern!

4-3-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #8 (#healer vision #damage)

• Q: You've spoken briefly about the possibility of a healer vision. This implies only healers may be allowed to view a characters wounds and status effects-.
• Is it likely that players from other archetypes will be able to also view characters (either allies, or enemies) wounds/bloodloss/effects in a similar manner, either for support abilities, or to further attempt to cripple a target?
• If stealthers were to get in to the game, I can see them having a similar ability to be able to take advantage of a vulnerable foe, negating the necessity for typical default spike damage openers.
  • A: To recap the idea of healer vision for those who might not know: Since we are using a unique system that includes injury to specific body parts, it can be important for a healer to be able to quickly ascertain what areas are in need of their special touch, and still be efficient about using their abilities. As you use the ability system to create the type of heals that suit your playstyle, you can select components that specifically target enemy body parts, or that target more general regions. This means you can choose to maximize your power in specific ways, instead of going for a default heal of the entire body.
  • In order to make the play experience as visual as possible, it might be fun and more engaging to create a method to determine those parts to be targeted. We are calling this idea “healer vision”. It could be expressed visually in many ways, but we want to do something that will match the look of Camelot Unchained. We’ve talked internally about perhaps a brief alternate view where auras and colors/patterns could help differentiate locations, as damage could be subtle and difficult to determine in a large battle over a large distance. It is still something we are debating, but it seems like a cool idea to have a limited magical vision of the needs of your friends!
  • Could this mechanic appear in other classes as you asked? Yes, it could. They would have their own versions of this ability to view necessary information, like enemy resistances, vulnerabilities, etc., which their archetype needs to know about in order to take appropriate advantage of them. However, keep in mind that nothing is free, and using this special vision would have a cost and prevent you from seeing the “regular world” for a time, possibly making you very vulnerable.

5-1-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #9 (#world)

• Q: What is the world we are on named? I have written several responses in the forums about things in the world and I have no idea what it is called.-
  • A: What will the final planet be called? That is an open field of possibilities and I suspect we will have many suggestions of some epic names for our new world, my personal preference is Platypi (I’m kidding!). Buried deep in the mind of MJ there is a hidden name, the finding of which is a neverending story.
  • From the hints we have so far, my understanding is that this is old Earth drastically changed by lore and catastrophic evolution that was pulled from the psyche of both our civilization and whatever lies beyond the Veil. It is a new, dangerous, exciting, and frightening place…”Here Be Dragons.”
  • Now Earthling,I know identifying the familiar might be tough, after all, there is a new set of moons! You can imagine that this and the Veilstorms rapidly changed the planet’s surface as the icecaps melted, the oceans swelled and retreated, volcanos erupted, and much of the original plants and animals died. This reborn world is full of unnatural disasters, broken lands covered with storms, and populated by strange creatures (I’m not just talking about the St’rm!). Even though it is vastly different than it started, we hope that the shattered world of Camelot Unchained will eventually feel like home to you.

Modding and UI

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#physics #middleware)

• Q: Will you allow members of the community to create add-ons to incorporate into the game / user interfaces etc?
  • A: Yes, we are interested in letting our community create add-ons and custom UIs etc. As long as we don’t feel that these will at all compromise security or enable cheats/hacks of any kind, we will indeed allow players to get creative. We also hope to work with add-on providers in a very significant way.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#social media #UI)

• Q: Ortu asked: how integrated do you envision CU being with various web and mobile services out of game?
  • A: Based on our current raise, not as much as I would like. We’re not aiming for FB, Twitter, etc., integration in the same manner that TESO is gunning for but, OTOH, we are not shooting for the same numbers/audience that they are targeting. I think we will have some fun bits in the game at launch and our web-based UI is pretty cool but beyond that, we’ll just have to see how we do with stretch goals.

Progression

4-11-2014 - Piercing the Veil #7 (#playstyle)

• Q: Is it possible to play with only RvR or crafter characters? or we need to do both to progress?
  • A: Yes, you can create and play just a PvP character or just a Crafter. The Crafters and PvP roles are being designed to compliment one another!

8-21-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #1 (#gameplay #progression #PvE)

• Q: I know you said no PvE, but will there be PvE?
  • A: No PvE grind for leveling purposes, but there will be other forms of player vs environment, such as chopping down a tree or mining for ore. All crafting, housing, and fighting is contributing to your realm and the global warfare. This means that there is no PvE leveling in the traditional sense, but there are plenty of things to do when you are not busy burning some enemy’s structure to the ground.

5-1-2015 - Unveiled Newsletter #9 (#components #progression)

• Q. Using the component system can you give examples of how its planned to work for a Player on day 1 versus the same Player after 300 hours of playing and developing the same character?
  • A: That is a very specific amount of time and example request, so let’s talk in more general terms. As a day 1 player, if you are completely new to the game you are going to want to understand how a lot of the basic systems work, and we are going to help you do that with some introductory assistance, potentially in a special starting area. After all, it would be quite concerning as a new player to step out of a safe area and be completely uninformed about the important parts of the game including the Ability system: different types of primary/secondary components, modifiers, dependencies, combinations, body part targeting, etc. It would be a tad overwhelming ;) Whether or not you decide to participate in the tutorial activities or skip them and venture out into RvR immediately, we should keep in mind that the term “day 1” in the answer below refers to the first time you enter the main world and not the tutorial area.
  • As a new person, getting acclimated and learning how to properly build your abilities with the components you have is key. You won’t be starting out with every component possible for your Class--far from it! However, don’t worry, you will be a capable character from “day 1” with an assortment of effective components in your chosen Class so you can certainly jump right in and RvR right from the beginning. The way you behave 300 hours later will be different, as you would be more specialized as you progress through a path (or create your own specialization) and you will also have a much greater pool of components to build completely new abilities. Some of those components might be well on their way to mastery, which would enable you train subsequent components and potentially fine tune some of the properties of the abilities that use them.
  • The fundamental difference between the “you” of the beginning and the “you” of the future, besides familiarity with the game itself, is that you will have many more situational options for abilities that are not simply upgraded versions of what you started with, but could lead to dozens of new potential combinations.

Technical

1-8-2014 - Piercing the Veil #4 (#physics #middleware)

• Q: You mentioned you will be using Havok Physics in Camelot Unchained. Will you be using any other middleware to do things like cloth simulation, destruction effects, etc.?
  • A: We’ll have to see how things shake out over the next two years. We are currently looking at another piece of middleware but until we finish our tests, we’re not going to commit to using it though we hope we will be able to use it. We’ll know more soon!

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#physics #CPU)

• Q: Will phsyics be optional or hardcored into the game?
  • A: It will be hardcoded into the game. That is how we are handling our collisons. That said, the part that is running on your client isn't the GPU, it's 100% the CPU side of things. So the non-optional part is going to run on the CPU, so it isn't going to make any difference what graphics card you run. It's also non-optional because you need to collide with the ground.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#AMD)

• Q: Would be possible to partner with AMD as well?
  • A: I certainly wouldn't rule that out. Once again, the server side phsyics works regardless of what card you have. It does not matter at all. The big scalability is happening on the server, on our hardware; it doesn't matter what you have, it matters what we have.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#physics)

• Q: Do you plan to have trebuchet and catapult shots to bounce around and use phsyics?
  • A: Yes, absolutely. That's a big part of what I belief in having a certain amount immergant behavior in your gameplay. Where, it's definitely not random, random numbers suck. No one wants to lose because an invisible dice rolled a 9, but it allows dynamic and unpredictable things to happen.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#physics)

• Q: Will the client predict and display physics before the server sends that data?
  • A: Yes. We don't simulate all the physics of the entire world on your client because you're just not running the same server hardware we are, but a range of a few hundren meters immedinately around you will be fully physically simulated.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#3d vision #SLI)

• Q: Will the game be supporting Nvidia 3d vision?
  • A: I definitely believe so, but that's not an ironclad commitment. SLI is an absolutely iron commitment.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#SLI)

• Q: Will there be any advantage in running SLI?
  • A: SLI basically lets you scale up to more pixels on your screen. so iIf you're low res, SLI may not help you that very much. If you're running at a high resolution or with lots of anti-aliasing SLI will help a lot.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#destruction)

• Q: With physics on the server does that mean you can do stuff like falling bricks from a keep wall?
  • A: Yes. We're not going to do every single brick, mostly because of network bandwidth reasons, but in general yes.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#streaming)

• Q: Stream capatiable by (Nvidia) Shield?
  • A: Yes.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#servers)

• Q: How big are the servers?
  • A: Not touching that one. It will be a different answer a year from now then it is today.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#graphics)

• Q: What generation of past graphics cards will be able to run the game smoothly?
  • A: Hard question. It's hard to compare generations due to high end lower generation cards often still outperform newer low end generation cards.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#performance #graphics)

• Q: What's the typical amount of players you'll be expecting to have on the screen at one time?
  • A: Go check out our videos going back to the Kickstarter. We always been pushing that really hard. I'm not afraid to make trade-offs to make game ugly to get that number higher. [Because gameplay comes ahead of graphics.]

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#graphics)

• Q: What about 144 hertz capacity?
  • A: Yes that is there, we have people already in IT running at that frequency.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#client #servers #network)

• Q: Will the client or server scale down phsyics based on what's going in the area?
  • A: The client will. The server is built pretty much to handle it. Where you will see scaling down is in the network bandwidth used.

7-18-2014 -BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#fun)

• Q: What kind of graphic card could render Andrew's beard?
  • A: They haven't built it yet.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#graphics #OpenGL)

• Q: Nvidia's help for an OpenGL port?
  • A: That's not really what we do, but there's some conversations with other people going on, but there's nothing to announce yet. We're a small team, our main focus is to make a great PC game.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#graphics #monitors)

• Q: What about multi-monitor support?
  • A: Yes.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#Nvidia #PhysX #HBAO #anti-aliasing)

• Q: What are you most excited about what Nvidia has on the table?
  • A: Obviously PhysX has the biggest impact on the game; they have done so much for us there already. In terms into what I'm looking forward to adding? Probably the HBAO horizon based anti-aliasing has the biggest impact in terms of check this box, and things get more awesome.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#graphics #lighting)

• Q: Will you have dynamic lighting?
  • A: Yes, absolutely.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#AMD #Nvidia #video)

• Q: Will video capturing be included?
  • A: I can say absolutely yes on Nvidia. Going to ATI/AMD I'm less sure about that; although, we'll definitely support their screen capturing.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#code #engine)

• Q: Anything on the code level that you can share about how you're solving the graphic engine challenges of a MMO?
  • A: The engine at it's core, is basically a little machine for batching, aliasing and merging things together. Where some engines may go and draw 10 characters, really what the graphic cards sees we're drawing 1 character that has 10 parts that are split around the world.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#code #patching)

• Q: Will you be able to patch behind the scenes and kept the client up for most patches for less downtime?
  • A: There's a fun video on that coming up.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#code)

• Q: Code question, tabs or spaces?
  • A: Spaces, spaces, spaces. No matter how you view your code you'll eventually get something with different tab settings. Everyone should use 4 space tabs, but they don't.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#CPU #GPU #performance)

• Q: Percentage of CPU or GPU?
  • A: We're very aggressively multi-threaded, so we're going to take advantage of more cores.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#code)

• Q: Editor of choice?
  • A: (Andrew) Visual Studio from my old dead fingers.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#physics)

• Q: Is server side physics going to lead to unresponsiveness and other problems?
  • A: We're doing a good job, the people in IT have seen things working well. It could if you did it wrong.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 (#collison detection)

• Q: Full collison detection?
  • A: There's no technical obstacles to it, whom you collide with is a gameplay problem. Technically, we're definitely colliding with enemies. Nothing in particular from your same realm that's a technical issue.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#DX12 #Mantle #performance)

• Q: Mantle and DX12?
  • A: Basically what they're doing is adding performance. If we get the point where we can deliver the performance we need without them, then that's awesome. In general we're more likely to go down thde DX12 route then Mantle route because DX12 is going to be supported on a lot more hardware.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#multiple screens)

• Q: Any support for multiple screens?
  • A: Yes. Yes multiple screens, yes multiple screens, yes multiple screens. I'm a triple screen gamer at home.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#latency #servers)

• Q: Will there be lag if you have a larger ping?
  • A: Sadly, yes; that's the nature of life. We're doing a lot of work to make that good, but no-one can go out there and say, "There will be absolutely no lag in our game even though our server is on a different continent from players." You can expect we'll possibly haved a European server, maybe.
  • The speed of light is a constant. No matter how much you would like it not to be. If there's a delay, the packet has to travel all the way here. There's no way we can anticipate that you were magically swing your sword at a guy. Now, is Andrew being really smart about the design, so it's not silly when you're missing one packet. Bottom line is that lag will be lag. IT has seen things for us get better, and we're focus on having a great performance for all our players from the US, Europe, and Asia. Including Austraila, and other places like New Zealand.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#graphics #innovation)

• Q: Can we expect some equally innovative things graphically?
  • A: Our focus on innovating with the gameplay. We're gonna do the graphics good enough. Nvidia has came in and given us a package of making good enough even better without a lot of effort from our part; which is wonderful.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#culling #performance)

• Q: What about culling?
  • A: The reality is that if there's someone on the complete opposite side of the continent from you we're not gonna spin the network bandwidth to tell you about that person. Though, you will not see the level of culling then what you've seen in certain other games. We're drawing a lot farther with more characters then what you're thinking of with culling.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#hacking #security)

• Q: How do you plan to stop people from reskinning camo?
  • A: I going to assume that means that essentially that changing people to having invisible textures or something like that. Not going to give a run down about absolutely every security feature in there. There's a lot of crypto in our patcher and asset pipeline though. There is a limit in what anyone can do with a program running on your computer because it's, your computer. We're doing a good job, we're not being dumb; I've been around the block on seeing the dumb ;).

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#day cycles #weather)

• Q: What kind of weather effects?
  • A: Right now we have a day/night cycle. We have something even cooler, whether we build gameplay from this or not, but I actually wrote a mini orbital mechanics simulator. The sun and the moon go through all their phases and seasonal changes now. Whether this will be part of gameplay or not is unknown. At least the possibility is there on the table.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#collison #physics)

• Q: With collison and server side phsyics won't there be rubber banding?
  • A: That's where we're having our war. The programming team and myself have a lot of focus on eliminating that. By using the exact same physics code for collison on the cliet and the server, they both see it simulate the exact same collison hopefully about the same time; which does cut down on that a lot.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#GPU)

• Q: What about mobile GPUs?
  • A: We like laptops. From a programming point of view, just that don't turn on every single feature.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#cosmetic #tech)

• Q: How likely is it that hair and cloth will be in at launch?
  • A: I would give that about a 50/50 shot. Some of the lighting type things are pretty much a slam dunk though.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#physics #spells)

• Q: Gravitational effects with spells?
  • A: We're running the spells through the physics system.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#Nvidia #PhysX)

• Q: What part of the Nvidia package is having the biggest impact?
  • A: Already answered that. PhysX is having the biggest pact on gameplay, ShadowWorks is having the biggest impact visually.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#light #rendering)

• Q: Sub rendering, forward plus rendering?
  • A: One again, the focus is to scaling up to very large numbers and forward plus lets you do massive numbers of lights. We're doing 2000 lights into scene, we can actually support players all having effects going off that generate light.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#latency)

• Q: Are you able compensiate for some packet loss?
  • A: Yes, we worked really hard on that. That's the core secret sauce our architecture.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#challenge #latency)

• Q: What is the biggest technical challenge that you guy have had to overcome so far?
  • A: The network architecture and dealing with packet loss. That is probably the single hardest thing I've written in my life, but seeing it all come together makes me really happy.
  • This is the stuff we have to do. So we're looking to do the smart thing. Not the expedient or pretty thing. We spent so much time on this, because if we don't do it now, it becomes harder to do six months from now, and almost impossible to do a year and a half from now.

7-18-2014 - BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2 (#tech #zergs)

• Q: How many people can zerg vs. zerg at the same without crashing from loading all the textures of every character?
  • A: That's a fun question. Warhammer, which I was the lead client engineer on, had a system where we basically would scale down and use smaller and smaller textures for people far away. So it would just be balancing the memory. You'll remember that WAR had some problems with that at launch, you would get up too close to something and the texture wouldn't be loaded in, and you would see low res things occasionally. About six months after launch those things were nailed down. I remember how I did it. So we're going from starting to solve that problem, and taking it to the next level.

11-26-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #4 (#code #stability #servers)

• Q:" What CSE is doing with letting in so many future players in at this stage is simply unprecedented. How much has this different rout change what get programmed in what order? For example, I get the distinct feeling that stability is far more importuned to you at this stage then it would be otherwise. Is this a good thing, bad thing, or it is what it is?
  • A: Keep in mind that we have (at least) two different branches of our code running on our servers. Our Wyrmling server is the most stable build, and is currently intended to be used for testing by our Alpha Backers. It is only updated once we have a build that has passed through a lot of play-testing by our Internal Testers, and is only available during set testing times. The Hatchery build is far less stable, but we like to keep it running 24×7, so our developers can test new and wondrous (and sometimes scary) things on it. While we don’t break Hatchery on purpose, its stability is a lot less important to us and to our Internal Testers. It goes down at times, has weird things happening (we have some interesting screenshots we can share at some point), and sometimes, well, it is just very cool. Our IT folks can gauge the progress of the game, and really be involved in the game’s development at a very early stage. Things change quickly, and it is exciting to see!
  • Overall, our programming team is focused on creating solid, relatively bug-free code (no code of this nature is ever bug-free at launch). While that is said a lot by developers, both our Alpha and IT testers can attest to how stable the game has been the vast majority of the time. Both Mark and Andrew have spoken a lot about our strict code review policy, which, while it has slowed down the game’s development, has resulted in an engine which has already shown that it can handle the crush of 2K players in a tiny world space, even though we are still a year and a half from launch!

11-26-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #4 (#requirements)

• Q: Many of us will upgrade our computers or buy new ones before launch. I often read people giving advice that games don’t really take advantage of newer, high end CPUs (“you don’t need more than an i5″ etc.). Will this be true for CU too?
  • A: It’s too early to give a definitive answer on the high-end benefits yet, but if you are a P.A.T.s player, you can see that we have minimum requirements to play, and those will evolve over time until launch. However, the requirements shouldn’t be of great concern, even if you don’t have a bleeding-edge system. We have been very clear regarding our intent for our game to run on a wide variety of CPUs and GPUs. We are NOT going to require that people have the latest and greatest computer, along with a Titan Black, or the best possible internet connection in your country. Now, what we do recommend is that none of our Backers run out to the store right this second to buy a system specifically to see all the best sparklies and effects of Camelot Unchained. Put off your purchase as long as you can, so you can get a better deal on your technology. As always, the newer the better for any game like ours.

Transportation

1-16-2014 - Piercing the Veil #5 (#teleport)

• Q: Will there be personal porting crystals? If so will they allow people to avoid combat, through escaping when out of combat?
  • A: Mark has stated that he wants to world to be large, and it will be, however it won’t seem large if people have unlimited fast-travel. So the short answer here is no.

2-21-2014 - Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 (#race #speed)

• Q: Will the small races be able to ride a larger race, if that race had mount transformation, or speed transformation.
  • A: As per the forums, I’m a supporter of that idea and that was one reason for my work on the Phouka. Will it happen? I don’t honestly know but I think it is one that I would like to see.

9-25-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #2 (#boats)

• Q: Will we be able to get out of NPC boats early, or will we have to ride all the way to the drop-off?
  • A: This is a mostly seamless open world, which means that there is no zoning in the traditional sense; only internal zones for us to split things up (The Depths™, starting cities, etc.) for the engine so there are minimal loading screens. There might be ways to decrease the ride time if you have a port on your property, are a water mage, or similar things. Who says you won’t be able to jump off and swim? None of these have been fully explored yet, so take them only as my thoughts!

9-25-2014 - Unveiled Newsletter #2 (#caravans)

• Q: Will caravans be sharable by more than one person to move goods, like can I share one with someone and make it more powerful and safe?
  • A: If you are asking if one caravan can hold goods for multiple people, then yes. You can definitely expect there to be ways for you to conscript someone else to haul your stuff from point A to point B for you if you don't want to do it yourself, and there may be a way to group up with a bunch of friends who all want to transport stuff together, and assemble a caravan of the appropriate size.

Sources

Newsletters and Updates Piercing the Veil #1 Piercing the Veil #2 Piercing the Veil #3 Piercing the Veil #4 Piercing the Veil #5 Piercing the Veil #6 Piercing the Veil #7 Bring Out Your Devs Part 1 Bring Out Your Devs Part 2 Unveiled Newsletter #1 Unveiled Newsletter #2 Unveiled Newsletter #3 Unveiled Newsletter #4 Unveiled Newsletter #5 Unveiled Newsletter #6 Unveiled Newsletter #7 Unveiled Newsletter #8 Unveiled Newsletter #9 Unveiled Newsletter #11

BSC Q&A BSC: Nvidia Q&A 1/2 BSC: Nvidia Q&A 2/2

Class Reveals Q&A Other Q&A