Ultima Online: News Ultima Online/News http://www.uoherald.com/news/ Last 25 news items posted from any news category http://mythicmktg.fileburst.com/uo/uoherald/images/news/all_news.gif Ultima Online: News http://www.uoherald.com/news/index.php © 2009 Electronic Arts Inc. All rights reserved. Publish 64.0.0.2 Notes 2010-03-04 16:19:03 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1023 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1023 Greetings!

We apologize for the delay in providing these notes, however, these changes have gone live with this mornings daily maintenance on all shards. Thank you!

Publish 64.0.0.2 Notes

  • Improved server stability
  • Resolved various issues with faction towns.

 

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James Nichols pubNotes
Stratics House of Commons Chat - Tonight, March 3rd! 2010-03-03 14:40:01 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1022 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1022 Greetings!

Its our pleasure tonight to once again be the guests in Stratics House of Commons IRC Chat - Join the developers of Ultima Online tonight, 3/3/10 at 7:00PM EST as we discuss the latest publish and what's to come!

For details on where to go and what to do please visit the link below:

Stratics House of Commons IRC Chat - Tonight 3/3/2010 @ 7:00PM EST

We look forward to seeing you there!

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James Nichols commNews
Lost & Found - Part 1 2010-02-26 15:59:49 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1021 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1021 Sherry’s whiskers shivered with anticipation as she crept between the aging stones of the castle. She’d suspected for quite some time that something lay behind the oddly foreshortened wall of the throne room, but it wasn’t until recently that she’d been able to find a place where the stones at the base were weakened enough to force a way through. Clearing away the crumbled stone had taken several tail-wrenching trips until a few of the castle servants began offering helpful hands. The end result was a new mouse hole and a dust coated Sherry but no amount of debris in her fur could detract from the thrill of discovery: soon she would be where no mouse had been before!

The air was close; chokingly full of dust and heavy with time. As she pulled herself through the tight confines of the hole and into the chamber beyond Sherry blinked in surprise. The area was faintly illuminated! Nervously casting about for the source of the glow, Sherry fastened her gaze upon a small bundle of what appeared to be silk. The source of the illumination was coming from within. Gingerly Sherry extended a claw to prod at the dusty fabric only to recoil with a startled squeak as the aging cloth parted and tore, disintegrating to reveal a strange translucent shape.

Tail in claw, Sherry edged closer to investigate…

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Amber Turner dev
Arirang Shard - Currently Unavailable 2010-02-24 12:13:38 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1020 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1020 Greetings!

We are currently investigating an issue with the Arirang Shard. Access to this shard is currently unavailable while we perform immediate hardware maintenance. There is no ETA at this time, please keep an eye on this article for information and updates during this downtime. Thank you for your cooperation and patience!

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James Nichols custServ
Writing Contest at UO Stratics! 2010-02-19 17:53:59 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1019 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1019 Have you ever wondered what Messana was like as a teenager? Well, whether you have or haven't you have the chance to write your version of her adolescence in a quirky and cool contest brought to you from the folks at UO Stratics.

 

 From UO Stratics


We all know or may think we know who Mesanna is now BUT, who was she
back in the day? Before she became famous? We want you to write a short
story to tell us who you think she was. This is a story of fiction so don't go
and try to find her bio. 


 For all the details, rewards, and how to enter click here.

We can't wait to read what you've cooked up - good luck and have a great weekend! 

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James Nichols commNews
Producer's Letter - Where are we and what the heck are we doing? 2010-02-12 20:45:02 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1018 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1018


Where are we? Busy.

By the time you read this, our Valentine’s Day publish should be out the door. Just so you know, a handful of our intrepid developers braved the snowy wilds of Northern Virginia to get everything staged and delivered. Now if that isn’t love, I don’t know what is.  This publish was the first step toward a six- month dev cycle for updates to the live game and updating some Stygian Abyss (SA) content.

We’ve made some core updates to Mysticism that from early reviews seem to be on the right track … For our publish in March we’re taking another look at the entire Mysticism spell line and amping it up a bit. Yes, I know … we didn’t just add an expansion and then move on, we really meant what we said about continuing to support what we’ve put out into the community.  Also, we’ve got some artifacts for humans that were never released for SA content. We have to get those out too.

And given that … what about Magincia? It’s just … there like the Statue of Liberty at the end of Ghostbusters II. (Esoteric reference +5 points) I will tell you there are four major topics that the team is discussing at present:

What follows is in no way a schedule or in any way meant to imply that these things will happen in the near term, but instead to give you a peek where my head is and what the team is iterating on …

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Calvin Crowner dev
Publish 64.0.1 - Shard Maintenance at 4:00PM EST 2010-02-12 15:44:30 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1017 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1017 Greetings!

 At 4:00PM EST all shards will be brought offline for maintenance for the release of Publish 64.0.1. Below are the notes for this publish detailing the changes we have made, thank you!

Publish 64.0.1

  • Valentine’s Gifts will be turned on today, 2/12/2010
  • Seed Trading Box are being removed from the game due to new found issues.
  • Cleaning up Navery’s Webs
  • Removing Sara the Trader from Moonglow.
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James Nichols pubNotes
Valentine's Day Gifts 2010-02-10 16:00:51 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1016 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1016 Greetings!

Valentine's Day Gifts will arrive on February 14th. We apologize for any confusion concerning this, have fun!

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James Nichols custServ
Publish 64 Now Live 2010-02-10 09:15:40 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1015 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1015 Greetings!

Publish 64 is now live world wide - below are the final notes for this publish (including the accompanied patch notes)

We hope you enjoy, have fun!

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James Nichols pubNotes
Publish 64 - Available on Origins Today! 2010-02-04 17:18:01 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1014 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1014 Origins will be receiving publish 64 today, for the notes on what's new please see this post and keep up the great feedback!

Additionally we have a few updates as well:

Publish

  • Players should be able to enter Dungeon/Cave entrances without any issues now.

Patch

  • Removed Spam Filter

 

 

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James Nichols pubNotes
Test Center - Publish 64 and Patch Notes! 2010-02-02 15:52:40 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1013 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1013 Greetings!

Today Publish 64 will be available on Test Center 1 and with it comes Valentine's and a whole list of changes you're sure to love (and we'd sure love to hear your feedback) so come check it out!

Continue reading for the full notes below!

 

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James Nichols pubNotes
Test Center - New Client and Publish Available Today 2010-01-19 14:01:59 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1012 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1012 Greetings!

The following changes will be availble on TC1 today, additionally we have included client changes available to all players. We encourage you to log into Test Center to check out the changes and give us your feedback, have fun!

Edit 2:20PM EST - Accidentally posted the wrong notes, we apologize for this oversight. The correct notes are now below, thank you!

Item Insurance Update

All items have been evaluated based on their true value and these values will now be used to determine insurance costs.

·         Scaling insurance cost

o   New insurance costs will be between 10gp and 600gp.

o   Magical items cost will be based on their worth in the Imbuing system.

§  All community collection items will remain 600gp.

o   Non-magical item cost is based on a percentage of the items vendor price.

o   Player will now be receiving 100% insurance value for player kills and factions players will receiving 50% insurance value for player kills.

·         New improved interface added to the player context menu

o   Displays all insurable items currently within the players backpack and equipped on paperdoll.

o   Displays current insurance status for each item.

o   Total insurance cost, the number of deaths payable, and the gold available are displayed for the player.

 

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James Nichols pubNotes
Reminder - Holiday Gift Tickets and Costume Trader 2010-01-14 17:25:43 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1011 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1011 Holiday Gift Tickets

You must log in with each eligible character before January 25th to get your holiday ticket. You do not have to use the ticket to claim the gift itself (there is no deadline for that). But 2009 tickets will not longer be available as of that date!

Costume Trader

Sarah will be leaving us at the end of the month. Make sure you've concluded all your trades with her by before February 2nd.

Friendly advice: avoid waiting for the last day to do it. Real life has a way of interfering at the most inopportune time and if your memory is anything like mine, you'll only remember you were supposed to do it the day after it's too late. Better safe than sorry!

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James Nichols genNews
New Publish - All Live Servers 2010-01-12 12:17:40 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1010 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1010 Greetings!

At 1:30PM EST we'll be releasing new publish changes to followup with yesterdays client. We have included notes for both the Publish and Patch that will be available, thank you!

Publish 63.0.0

  • Due to the issues brought about by the recent hueing changes we have added new skin dyes to the Alchemist and Provisioner NPC’s – this will allow players to dye their skin to any hue within their race.  The name of the dye is Skin Tingeing Tincture.  The cost of the tincture is approx 2,500.
  • Fixed a vendor exploit involving skill/stat changes.

Patch
7.0.4.4 (Legacy)
4.0.4.4 (Enhanced)

  • Fixed an issue with cave walls blocking movement
  • Reverting Snow
  • Auto-joining a non-existent custom chat channels on login will now auto-create the channel instead of notifying the player that the channel does not exist.
  • The volume on the Reveal Spell has been reduced.
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James Nichols pubNotes
Login Difficulties 2010-01-11 19:37:10 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1009 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1009 Greetings!

We are currently aware of login difficulties players may be experiencing when attempting to access the game. We are working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible and will update if more information becomes available.

Thank you for your cooperation and patience!

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James Nichols custServ
New In-Game Items at UO Game Codes 2009-12-23 20:12:58 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1008 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1008 Greetings!

Today we have several new items available on UOGameCodes.com just in time for the holidays! We’ve provided details below, visit UO Game Codes to purchase.

Smuggler’s Edge

The perfect thief needs a perfect weapon! The Smuggler’s Edge has a 5% chance to proc a stealing attempt when fighting a mob.  If the proc is not successful you have a chance of gaining skill in stealing instead.  If you have natural stealing skill you have a chance to steal one of two new stealable rares:

  • Smuggler’s Tool Box – Produces lockpicks daily
  •  Smuggler’s Lantern – Has Spell channeling, faster cast, and is hued

Undertaker’s Staff

  This weapon is perfect when you’re in a jam! (Or just don’t feel like running.) The Undertaker’s Staff can be used to retrieve your corpse if it’s within 40 tiles and you are not a criminal.

Merchant’s Earrings

Who needs to haggle with a set of baubles like these? The Merchant’s Earrings are a charged pair of earrings that discounts player run vendor costs per day.  Deducts one charge per day, there are two versions: The 40 use version grants a 10% discount and the 90 use version grants a 5% discount. 

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James Nichols commNews
Immediate Downtime: All Shards - Publish 63.2 2009-12-18 17:33:12 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1007 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1007 Greetings!

We will be bringing all Shards offline for immediate maintenance at 5:45 PM EST. At this time we anticipate that all Shards will be back online no later than 8: 00 PM EST. We apologize for the short notice.

Please read on for the full 63.2 Notes

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Andy Belford custServ
Game Update - 12/17/09 2009-12-17 18:10:42 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1005 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1005 Greetings!

This evening we have released a new client for users to patch. Additionally we will be publishing additional server changes during schedule maintenance.

Publish 63.1

  • Houses will no longer evict chickens when players claim them from coops.
  • Players stuck in body-changing forms (such as Animal Form) will be reverted to their original form on login.

Patch Notes

Version 7.0.4.3 (Classic)
Version 4.0.4.3 (Enhanced)

  • It’s snowing!  Turned on snow terrain for the holidays.  NOTE: This is only a temporary change.
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James Nichols patchNotes
Player Notice - 12/17/09 2009-12-17 15:56:19 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1004 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1004 Greetings!

Currently some players may be impacted by an issue that causes transformations to persist through logout. We are working to find a solution to return players to their normal forms to be included in the next maintenance cycle.

We appreciate your for your patience and apologize for our alchemists behavior. Thank you!

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James Nichols custServ
Publish 63 to all Live Shards Tommorow - 12/16/2009 2009-12-16 20:54:26 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1003 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1003 Greetings!

Publish 63 is coming to all live Shards tomorrow, 12/16/2009. Deployment of the Publish will commence with European Shards at 12:00 AM EST and will continue on the normal maintenance schedule.

For the full Publish 63 notes please read after the jump. Below are the additional changes we have made since TC1 last week:

Publish

  • Fixed an issue that prevented skill on various artifact and crafted items from being detected by the imbuing system.
  • Some community collection items cannot be imbued due to the balance issues.
  • Eternal Guardian Staff cannot be imbued due to balance issues.

 

Patch

  • Updated Global Chat color to blue to improve readability in the Journal.
  • Fixed Classic Client crash when user clicks the Leave gem while the Create Channel dialog is open.
  • Disabled Trial Accounts from participating in custom chat channels.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented players from being able to enter certain cave entrance

Thank you!

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Andy Belford patchNotes
Origins Server Downtime - Publish 63.0.0 Release 2009-12-15 13:33:18 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1002 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1002 Greetings!

At 2:00PM EST Origins will be brought offline to release Publish 63. Additionally Client 7.0.4.2 (Legacy) and 4.0.4.2 (Enhanced) will be available to all servers. We anticipate Origins to be back online by 4:00PM EST.

For the full Publish 63 notes please read here. Below are the additional changes we have made since TC1 last week:

Publish

  • Fixed an issue that prevented skill on various artifact and crafted items from being detected by the imbuing system.
  • Some community collection items cannot be imbued due to the balance issues.
  • Eternal Guardian Staff cannot be imbued due to balance issues.

Patch

  • Updated Global Chat color to blue to improve readability in the Journal.
  • Fixed Classic Client crash when user clicks the Leave gem while the Create Channel dialog is open.
  • Disabled Trial Accounts from participating in custom chat channels.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented players from being able to enter certain cave entrance

Thank you!

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James Nichols pubNotes
Publish 63 Coming to Test Center Today! 2009-12-11 14:26:17 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1001 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1001 Hail adventurers!

Publish 63 will be available on TC1 today, we have a number of other changes in addition to the imbuing improvements that were released earlier this week. Below are the full notes for this publish (including the changes to imbuing) so have a look then see for yourselves on TC1, have fun!

Update - 12/11/09 @ 5:40PM EST: We've added two additional client notes to address issues that we have resolved with this afternoons client. Please see the Patch section of the notes for details. Thank you!

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James Nichols patchNotes
UO named one of the "Most Revolutionary Videogames of All Time" 2009-12-08 16:41:04 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1000 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=1000 Ultima Online had the honor today of being named one of "The Most Revolutionary Videogames of All Time" by Forbes.com.

As many of you know UO was the one to unveil the joy, excitement, and adventure of MMO's to the world and we're proud that it continues to carry on this tradition with a vibrant and active community today over a decade later.

From Forbes.com:

"Fans of role-playing games remember fondly the Ultima series, which dates back to the original "Ultima I" from 1980. But when Electronic Arts took Lord British's empire online in 1997, it changed gaming forever."

So join us in celebrating and thank you to those of you who continue to make UO what it is today whether you've been with us from the start or just getting started. We look forward to many more years with you!

Source: http://www.forbes.com/2009/12/07/video-games-wii-technology-revolutionaries-09-games_slide_11.html

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James Nichols genNews
12 Days of Mythic - On Twitter! 2009-12-07 16:41:35 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=999 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=999 Ho, ho, ho and Happy Holidays!

The team here at Mythic Entertainment is celebrating the end of a great year and the beginning of the next with 12 days of Mythic! Last Friday we kicked things off with simply a YouTube video and a tweet but now we want to give everyone a chance to join in on the fun!

For the remaining nine days keep an eye on Twitter and follow the @MythicNews account to catch the daily message celebrating each of the 12 days of Mythic on YouTube! Everyday we'll select one lucky winner and send them a present from the team here at Mythic celebrating all of the great games you enjoy.

So what are you waiting for? Todays message is already up and ready to be re-tweeted. Sign up at www.twitter.com and follow your favorite Mythic games @MythicNews.

Happy Holidays (and Twittering),

Your friends at Mythic Entertainment

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James Nichols dev
Imbuing Changes Going to Test Center 1 Today! 2009-12-07 15:10:41 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=998 http://www.uoherald.com/news/news.php?newsid=998 Greetings!

Today we will be releasing the Imbuing overhall we have been working on to go live with Publish 62.3.7. We encourage those interested to hop onto TC1 this week to check it out, we want to get this hammered out before it goes live and as you can see we've made some significant improvements!

Below you will find all of the notes, enjoy and see you on Test Center!

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James Nichols pubNotes