Class Changes

MASSIVE ONCE PER VERSION CLASS CHANGE PROJECT IS COMPLETED!

First a note and warning from Vryce:

Medievia is a deep game with many features. The developers listen to player feedback and add/change features constantly. The game is different literally every time it restarts! That being said, I do not allow changes to our four classes often. Changing classes is more complicated than changing any other feature and often triggers more animosity than any other change except CPK changes.

The reason is that warriors, mages, clerics, and thieves must be balanced in power and abilities, and yet somehow they must be UNIQUE and DEPENDENT UPON each other. If you change any one thing in one class, you upset the class balance, and class balance is THE key core dynamic of gameplay.

The other reason I do not allow class changes often is that certain players can be very vocal against changes, especially about class balance. If we add a single mage spell I get emails for weeks about how I am ignoring warriors, making clerics useless, making mages too powerful, and basically "ruining the game." It is the same if we change a warrior skill, tweak a cleric spell, change some class-specific equipment, etc.

Did we add new classes? Most other RPGs just add new classes instead of truly trying to balance their current ones. They end up with dozens of classes and races that are terribly unbalanced. In the end these games have players all playing the best three or four classes anyway, and the other classes are basically there to trip up new players who do not know which classes are the best to play.

So here we are, the BIG MEDIEVIA V CLASS CHANGES project. What is the warning?

WARNING: We do not allow global discussion of class changes unless you are capable of proper and respectful dialogue. We will instantly gag every player who says one word that a god takes to be disrespectful to the game, the gods, or the changes.

WHAT YOU CAN DO:
- Medievia allows you to email the owner and any developer and actually expect a response.
- You can speak to the owner and developers in real time in the game, one-on-one or in groups.
- You can run for Governor and have the players elect you to represent their interests to the developers.

WHAT YOU CANNOT DO:
- Disrespect the game, the gods, the players, or these changes in any way to the public.
- Be overly sarcastic on global channels about these changes.
- Give your opinion in any way unless you can communicate respectfully and honorably.

Thanks and congratulations to Melquiades for managing this project, to Fayla for coding the changes, and to every other god and player who helped implement and test these tricky changes.

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From Melquiades:

In the past twelve years, Medievia's classes have changed very little. To be sure, some changes have been made, such as the addition of powerful spells like Phantasmal Images, Manashield, and Malediction. The changes we are introducing today are much more comprehensive in scope and touch each of the four classes in a different way.

Our goals when we set out were simple: differentiate the classes by making them more specialized, give our players a new way to interact with each other and the game, and create significant change based on the vision of the players. The last goal is something that Medievia was founded on, and it has always been a valued tenet of this fine game we all love, but I can assure you that when the call went out to our players in October, the response was massive. Eighty percent of these changes were either direct player ideas or inspired by players. This is what we asked for, so thank you!

All the changes made are listed in HELP CLASSCHANGES. This will likely be the easiest way to get a high-level view of the changes. HELP SPELLS has been updated to reflect all the new additions, as have HELP THIEF and HELP WARRIOR. Each individual skill or spell that has changed also has an updated help file.

The class changes brought with them a need to tweak some equipment and also generated some new equipment types. Read HELP EQCHANGES to see a list of those changes.

We are in BETA MODE (read HELP BETA), so the things we absolutely need from players now are bug reporting and GOOD feedback on how to make things better. We understand things may not work just right, but some constructive feedback will go a lot further toward fixing things.

An example of good feedback might be, "I'm not sure rage is strong enough for the trade-off in lag, maybe you could tweak the damage or lag somewhat."

Making general statements of negativity doesn't really help us solve any problems. It is okay to disagree with how something works or think it's silly or dumb, but if you want to be heard you should include a suggestion as to where to go from here or include an actual argument as to why something is no good.

All feedback should be MUDMAILED to Melquiades. He will forward the emails to the appropriate parties. Please do not mail other gods directly, just MUDMAIL to Melquiades! Make sure your character's email address is up to date to ensure we can get back to you.

You can also use the WOM Bulletin Board to discuss things in a more public forum; the board is west from the first room of MedLink. It is YOUR responsibility to keep your posts civil and neat on that board. Remember that this board is a public forum for discussion, not bashing.

We started final debates about these class changes in October of 2007, we began coding in December, and now we can pass them on to you all.

A tremendous THANK YOU needs to go to Vryce, Seraphyr, Fayla, Melquiades, and Zathal. Without those five individuals these changes would absolutely not exist today. We also need to thank Kostia, Taethyst, Zuasha, and Damonius for tackling specific projects with some impressive results, as well as Lunavina, Calrog, and the rest of the god staff for their contributions and patience.

Too many people contributed to list them all, including you, the players. This was an amazing team effort, so enjoy!

-Medievia WOM Staff