Pirate101: Test Realm Notes

Here they are, with thoughts in another post after I have digested the notes!

Introducing Marleybone and Aquila

Yarr! Adventures await ye in the highly anticipated release of Books 13 and 14 in Pirate101! With the introduction of both the war-torn skyway of Marleybone and the legendary beauty and danger found throughout Aquila, high-level pirates will now continue their rebel journey against the evil Armada! All characters who have finished the quest "The Great and Powerful Turtle" in MooShu must now visit Avery in his office to continue their adventures with the quest "That Darn Cat" (You'll know you have completed this if you own the "Enlightened One" Badge in your list of badges).

We hope you’re impressed as the amount of content being released is almost double what would normally be released in an expansion, and as such, players will now be able to level their characters from 50 to 65 (both regular and nautical level)! 

With new levels comes increased power for players: Remember to visit your trainers often, since beginning at level 52 and every 2 to 3 levels afterwards, you’ll unlock new talents or powers for your character. Speaking of power, tons of new weapons and gear await you in both worlds, and even the mini-games will return better rewards for higher level players. There’s new ship equipment waiting for you as well—TIME TO SUMMON THE KRAKEN! Worried about the cost of these new power ups? Don’t be! Your available gold cap has been increased to 200,000 gold.

New Companions abound--additional companions await your discovery, Pirates, and many of your old companions will discover new powers and tiers of promotion available to them.

You’ll need the additional power since your journey won’t be without danger—with greater reward comes greater challenges! Prepare yourself to battle with and against a host of new faces: Kurghas, Grenadiers, Anarchists, War Golems, Vultures, Manticores, Ophidians, Eagle Centurions, Ettins, Trolls, Sirens, Minotaurs, Krakens, Crokagators, and Gorgons await you!

The fun definitely doesn’t stop there as a lot of effort has been done to bring our players everything from new ambient creatures, NPCs performing daily activities in several towns and battle props to additional treasure chests and training tomes in hidden locations. And if that isn’t enough, Zeke is back with new exploration quests! 

We’re excited to invite you to Marleybone and Aquila, and hope you enjoy this new journey as much as we’ve enjoyed creating it for you.

NOTE: Because of the amount of changes and new content, the download for this update is larger than usual. Please be patient and allow the game to load—it’ll be worth it!

Time to Shop with the new Bazaar!

A new Bazaar has opened shop on Skull Island, and it’ll give pirates access to tons of items found by other pirates. Be sure to visit Harvey Deuce in the building directly to the right as you exit Avery's Court (on the same side and right before Kraken Skulls Tavern). Sell your extra items to Harvey, and he’ll pay you the value in gold for your items based on supply and demand. If Harvey already has lots of the item you are selling, he pays you less gold for yours. If he’s low or out of stock of an item you are selling, he’ll pay you more! No matter what, Harvey always offers  a better price than other shopkeepers. While Harvey is good at what he does, there are some unique and rare items that Harvey just simply can’t purchase, and those items are marked “No Auction” in the item’s  description. Buying items is easy too! The more of an item Harvey has, the cheaper it will be, and the fewer of an item he has, the more expensive it will be. If you see an item you like, buy it, it may not be there next time you visit. All prices are based on Harvey’s current haul of treasure, so shop often to find the best price, Pirates! And don't worry, if someone sells an item on the Boochbeard Realm, and you're on the One-Eyed Jack Realm, you'll see it in Harvey’s inventory. New Tutorial and Early Game Changes

We’ve created a new tutorial that’s tons more exciting! There will be more interesting enemies to confront, more visually impressive effects and critical moves, a more cinematic approach, and a quick peek at broadside combat. We’ve also made it so you can skip past that initial “Somewhere in the Spiral” text if you’d like, but definitely don’t skip the new tutorial if you haven’t seen it before. Make a new character today! In addition to the new tutorial change, we’ve made several other changes to the early part of the game that players are sure to enjoy: The following early side quests can be more easily obtained and completed in the Free-to-play areas of Skull Island: Dagger Overboard! Motl's Home Brews A Priceless Antique A Flask of Pure Gold A Dash of Bitters Up For Crabs Jacques of Diamonds Message in a Bottle A new vendor has come to Skull Island--introducing "Don Ready," who sells the following One-Day Rental Mounts to players: Lonely Buffaloon, Flying Manta Ray, Lurching Lobster, and Prancing Pony. Rocks and barrels in the first areas of Skull Island are now untargetable. The Temple of Gloom now has some new interesting enemies to battle. All initial battles with Troggies are now single player only. The Troggy Artillery quest is now a bit easier so there is less back and forth to Lt. Smollet. Added more yum fruit to the new player areas.

Turret Bosses! We've noticed our players enjoy grouping up to fight ships together, so we've added three new turret bosses to the game that are meant to be a multiplayer experience out in the Skyways. Turrets are towers in the skyway that attack up to 4 ships at a time and have a large amount of health. Be on the prowl for the turret bosses in Cool Ranch, Mooshu, and Marleybone—your Nautical XP Parties will definitely be more exciting!

Transportalators! Transportalors are a new method of traveling between the worlds of The Spiral in Pirate101. You’ll find an operator in each world. For a fee (gold for members and Crowns for others), they’re willing to send you to another portal as long as you’ve already entered that world on a ship: Skull Island, Skull Island: Brataq Bey (Note: Transportation to Skull Island is free) Monquista, St. Bonobo's Abbey: Drayauq Bey Valencia, Sivella: Geraq Bey Cool Ranch, Cooper's Roost: Raqnor Bey Mooshu , Hamamitsu Gardens: Oshu Bey Marleybone, Isle of Dogs: Kasuf Bey Aquila , Nova Aquila: Ryaq Bey

Second Chance Chests Have you ever battled your way through a tough dungeon, only to be disappointed that you didn't receive the reward you were hoping for at the end? Our pirates can now pay a small Crowns fee to get a second chance at what's in the boss’s treasure trove! Some final boss encounters will contain a chest in the room that offers a second chance to find the item they wanted. Simply use the chest that appears after your initial duel, pay a few Crowns, and you are given a second chance at the exact same rewards the boss drops normally. Each time you use the chest, the price will increase. There's no guarantee you will receive the item you had hoped, these are Second Chance chests, and nothing in life is guaranteed.

New Combat Rules A few changes have been made to help ease delays in combat and clear possible confusion: Once a battle board has been filled by four players, no additional “different” players may join the combat if one of the original four players flees. (Multiplayer only) If a player doesn’t issue any orders for a planning phase, in the next planning phase they will be presented with a dialog that says “Are you still playing?” If “Yes” isn't clicked within 10 seconds, then the absent player is forced to Flee.

Other Combat Changes After careful review of our existing content, we are slightly increasing the difficulty of combat beginning at about level 25. Enemy epic talents have been rebalanced to provide more interesting (and more challenging) combat. Double Tap will no longer trigger from destroying a battle board prop as this was unintended. Bombs will no longer visually trigger fire effects before the bomb impacts the ground. The durations of Artillery and Rain of Mortarshells are now displayed on their ability cards. Musketeer powers now all deal magical damage. Powers that are unable to be used by a player will display a lock icon in the My Powers Menu. Canister Shot now shows damage for all of its hits. Rapid Fire has a new, snappier animation The Musketeer Snap Shot power will no longer show the player aiming at the target's feet. Musketeers will now learn Scatter Shot before learning the skill Rapid Shot.

Gear Added new tiers for Dino Pack gear, Retail store Bundle gear, and the Boochbeard Bundle gear. Old Scratch's headdress is now on his loot table. Players' "totems" will not be incorrectly referred to as "Tokens" occasionally. The "Sotrm Rider's Pendant" is now the "Storm Rider's Pendant." The "Butal Band" ring is now the "Brutal Band" ring. The Fire Archer's Jingaza hat now appears correctly when mounted.

Companions New promotions are now available for the following companions: The Magnificent Seven Bonnie Anne Ratbeard Several companions are now more vocal during combat: Black Angus Bones McGee Monkey King Shiruku Neko Romba Fin Dorsal Several companions have undergone a few cosmetic improvements: The Monkey King now has footstep sounds when he walks. Reduced the size of Madclaw and lowered him to the ground. Improved Bones McGee's look. Fixed Black Angus's Mustache. Ensign Emmett will now proudly show his name. Removed Egg Shen's constant flipping animation, but he will still perform some acrobatics while he's idle for a while. New Critical animations have been created for all Magnificent Seven companions and Nurse Quinn. Other companion changes are as follows: Companions who share the same class as your character gain a slight boost in XP from Training Tomes. We have reduced the variation in companion quality in an effort to make all companions more worthwhile. Companions who were previously "third string" have been boosted up to "second-string" status. They will have more non-epic talent slots to purchase simple upgrades like Accuracy, Armor, etc. We have removed all of the "fixed" talent slots from companions. All companions, whether they join you at the beginning of the game or later, can freely choose where to spend all of their non-epic talent slots. Additional ranks of both non-epic and epic talents are now available to companions who meet the level requirements. Made a few changes to Mormo's first promotion quest so it proceeds more logically. Players can no longer purchase Martin or Moresco Valvida for a second time after promotion. Dodge timing corrected for Samoorai Musketeer.

Ships Major Ship changes are as follows: To make ship combat a bit more exciting, all ship damage powers have a 20% reduction in the time it takes to use them again. Base ship damage has been adjusted to match, and ship Token appearance rates have also been adjusted accordingly. The Base Nautical XP awarded for combat with ships has been increased by 25%. Players onboard your ship as a crewmember will now receive Nautical XP during broadside combat. The amount awarded is roughly half what the captain earns. Also, we've limited the effective level of the mob for Nautical XP calculations to 10 levels above the player's Nautical level, to address concerns about power leveling. A new Quick Refill button has been added to the interface to more easily allow players to purchase fuel (instead of having to open the Crown Shop and click on the Elixir tab). Players will now earn progressively less nautical experience if their nautical level exceeds their player level (i.e., a soft cap on Nautical XP is now in place). Note that Nautical XP awarded by quests will not be affected by the new Nautical XP rules for combat. The level 50 Marleybone Galleon that was sold for gold in MooShu has been removed. The new Marleybone Galleon is level 54 and will be sold for gold somewhere in the Marleybone skyway. Likewise the level 52 Marleybone Galleon in the Crown Shop is now a level 56 ship; however the required level of 44 has not changed. Fuel efficiency is now about two times greater across the board than what it was previously before the update. Many high level ships will target multiple enemies. Other ship modifications are as follows: Added new "Bane" and "Death From Below" debuffs for high level ships. The Goronado figurehead and Alto Velas sails no longer intersect each other on the Monquista skiff. Ships now all have the correct "sailing" sigil instead of the "boarding" sigil. The ship health meter will turn yellow at exactly 50% instead of when under 50% health. Lessened the chances of ships overlapping each other due to combat with enemies flying in the skyway. The Pet whistling sound no longer plays when using the steering sigil and having a mount equipped. Friend Names in the skyway will appear light blue as they do on land. Chat bubbles correctly indicate the location of the speaker in the skyway. Broadside power buffs and debuffs are now non-stacking. Improved the Ship UI so the preview window and header match the currently selected ship. Choosing a non-equipped ship will display "This Ship is Bottled". Ships will once again appear to sink when destroyed. Some zones will now announce that unbottling a ship is not allowed. Equipping the Alto Velas Sails on the Monquistan Skiff Ship will no longer give the appearance of white bars

Quest Sharing Quest Sharing is a new feature that allows players currently to share only certain Book 1 side quests. Sharing a side quest will allow you to get your group members on the same quest as if they had accepted it via NPC: No Mainline quests can be shared. You must be grouped to share a quest with a group member. A quest can only be accepted if the group member is eligible to accept the quest from the NPC. Many times there are multiple steps to a quest--a shared quest will begin from the first step of the quest regardless of the current quest step the sharing player has reached. To share a quest, open your Quest panel and click the share button in the top right hand corner. NOTE: The icon only displays when you are in a group and have a quest that can be shared with your group mates. After clicking the share quest button, your group member will then see a dialog box asking them to accept or deny the quest.

Other Quest Changes Major quest changes are as follows: Rejoice! Quests now sort themselves on the quest page in this order: Mainline, Trainer, Promotions, and Sideline. Icons also added to top-left corner of the quest window to indicate the quest type. Some encounters can be repeated and grant experience according to the number of times it has been completed: 100% XP for the first completion, 50% for the second, and 0% for all completions after that. Moved Mr. Harker's Cane to a more visible location for the side quest "Lost and Found," and the quest will now grant a reward. Several changes were made to the “Go Go Stormzilla” encounter: Stormzilla will now spawn up to eight eggs on the battle board. Certain companion powers will now be available to players during the Stupendor X fight (That's right! Companions now help from inside the giant metal suit!) Adjusted stats and health of Stupendor-X and Stormzilla. Added a life fountain near the instance entrance. Reduced the quantity required to collect and increased the percentages to collect for the following quests: Hook, Line, and Sinker To Avernus, and Beyond! Setting Things Right Coils of the Serpent Black Storm Rising Showdown at Boot Hill Other general quest changes are as follows: Polished the Buccaneer training quest, "Chances With Wolves" and made it a little less punishing. Slightly lowered the level of Jesse and Frank Cranes. Made a few Quest Helper improvements (Specifically for Cavern of the Crescent moon, Yak Where We Belong, Making Preservations, and Message in a Bottle). The quest title "Troubled Times: The Mark of Toro" has been shortened to simply "The Mark of Toro." The quest "Watch Out for Xian-Bi" has been renamed to "North Wind Blows." Reduced the number of Armada patrolling the Valencian Catacombs and made them slightly easier to avoid. Adjusted spider paths near Monkey King's cage (so they are a little less hazardous). Prospector Zeke now proudly shows his Explorer title. Added a sigil to the Duck of Death ship within his instance. Fixed the non-moving spearmen in the Mogatu Battle for the quest The Soggy Crusade. Players will no longer get stuck while turning the cannon during the Fort Elena instance. Watermoles now patrol the Tobi Taa Cavern of Watermole Beach and no longer stand idle on the sidelines during battles. Lowered NPC names and added a little extra space between the names and the “Wizbang” (i.e., the question mark or exclamation point above their names). Corrected the spelling of "Sujimura" in the quest "The Way of The Sword." The Crab Hermit is now located next to Historian Costanza. Added a new Beehive Battle board prop in The Dark Jungle. Players will now receive a dungeon warning notification when entering the "Standoff at Boot Hill" encounter. Miguel de Olivares, who used to the deliver the line, "But we aren't monks . . ." in the quest Heart of Darkness, will no longer look like a monk. Teleporting to the Dan Drake fight while not having the quest will no longer interfere with normal quest progression for the player. Corrected the sigil for the quest "Wolf's Grievance," which said you were entering the "Ghost Cave" instead of the "Scaly Grotto" Ridolfo will now disappear from his room after he joins your crew from completing the quest "The Resistance Lives On!" Your Armada disguise in Valencia will now reappear after you win a random battle board encounter.

Crown Shop We’ve added several new items to the Crown Shop that we think you’re going to love! Added a Bric-A-Brac Elixir that will increase the size of allowable items in a house by 50 slots (up to 300 items max) Added an Additional Housing Space Elixir Added two new Nautical XP Boost Elixirs Added a new Aquilan Pegasus Mount (our first unlockable badge Mount) Added several new unlockable Marleybone and Aquila Companions More Crown Shop surprises will be added later once we reach the live server! The following Crown Shop improvements have also been made: Players are now prevented from buying gold in the Crown Shop if the purchase would put them over the gold cap. Temporary Mounts will now start their counter when first equipped, instead of when purchased. The Gold Boost Elixir now rewards bonus gold for both combat and quest received gold. Crown Shop Mounts will no longer appear locked when you are in a zone where you can't purchase them. There is a familiar new Crown Shop symbol in the top left hand corner of the interface

Housing Players who purchased the “Castaway’s Cove” house may notice that some of the placed wall items are no longer visible. This is due to a recent adjustment to the house to correct a few issues. To retrieve these missing items, select the “Pick Up All Items In This House” button from the decorate menu. You will then need to manually place each item back to its original desired location. For those with a lot of spare gold lying around, we've added larger piles of gold that can be purchased as housing items so you can show off your wealth! Ensured housing items cannot be picked up and placed in a player's backpack when the backpack is full (which would previously destroy the item). Rugs are a little easier to place in the Volcano Island House now. Players may now add more items to their alcove in the Castaway Cove House. Balanced the height of the Nautical Wall wheel housing item. Removed the incorrect Crown Item symbol from Miss Mallory's Wall Hangings she had for sale in Tumbleweed. Attic interface now uses the correct item limits. Updated housing tutorial tips to be more accurate.

General Game Polish Several server and game changes have been made in an effort to continue improving our Players’ overall Pirate101 experience and game performance. We’ve also extended that polish to some more unwandered corners of The Spiral. Here’s a quick snapshot of some of these changes: Frame rates in all skyways have improved so players will experience less lag. Made several changes to shorten the size of initial download of Pirate101. Lowered the amount of water level in the Flooded Tunnels so that smaller treasure chests are easier to see. Made over 40 individual fixes to MooShu textures and geometry which addressed several issues with sigils, docks, battle board props, fences, cave exits, ships, scrolls, towers, waterfalls, vases, crates, foliage, ceilings, shadows, tree branches, ground, and railings. Made many other art polishes around the Spiral to seams, maps, walking surfaces, quest icons, Troggy dream-catchers, campfires, torches, the Training Tome Vendor in the Black Spot Tavern, the MooShu Octopus ship Figurehead, the ridgeline in The Gold Monkey encounter, the Ground in The Dark Jungle, the ceilings in Flotsam, and general clipping and collision issues. Our grammar was corrected in the quest “One Good Favor..." Moo Manchu no longer shrinks or turns into an oni upon defeat. Added rocks to the Froggo Villa Cave map where they appear in game. Corrected many icon colors of the billethead figurehead icons. Corrected the animation timing when the Rebel Water Mole Slingmen swing and miss an attack. Jail Cell Bars within the Presidio are now visible from all angles. A sign has been placed outside the General Store in Santa Pollo to indicate there are clothing vendors inside. Added the missing door and columns in the Santa Rana instance in Cool Ranch for the quest El Toro Unleashed! Players will no longer get stuck on some of the drains in Monquista. Added missing back walls to some houses on Skull Island. Touched up several Portrait pictures including Nelly Nickelby, Bishop Hidalgo, Bill Bobstay, Gortez, Madame Vadima, Queen Isadore, King Fernando, Donkey Hotay, Dr. Noh, Bat Masterson, Buffalo Bill, Soaring Skies, El Guapo, and more! Made many combat camera fixes where pillars, ceilings, trees, and walls would interfere with the battle board action. Gilbert and Sullivan now animate while talking. Weapons will now return to a normal position upon dismounting the Buffaloon

Chat Continued refining the words that are allowed to be said in game chat. The phrase "Please click the Done button to advance combat" has been added to Menu Chat. Added new PvP chat options to Menu Chat.

General Added more secret chests throughout the game, and new badges have been added to the game for collecting hidden chests around The Spiral. All player emote animations, selected from Menu Chat, are now working correctly. Moved the Bone Drakes back a little farther from the windlanes in Avernus and moved the jellyfish back a little farther from the windlanes in the Spiral pathways. Modified the number of wisps in many zones--some had too many and some didn’t have enough. Pet names will no longer change upon zoning. Easter pets may now be successfully sold to vendors. Dismounting when activating a sigil now has a dismounting particle effect. Made the Witchdoctor class icons more consistent looking. Having Friend Requests turned off will now show your name to another player who tries to add you as a friend. Moved Eloise slightly away from Zeke in the Hamamitsu Garden The Monquistan Stormgate and map label now state a violet Windstone is required for passage. We’ve modified the notification when a player joins a group to more correctly indicate who created the group.

Interface If a player goes link dead during combat, their portrait will now show a broken chain icon. Experience bars will now hide when a player reaches the level cap. Added some new bounce and shine to the Done button once combat moves have been selected. Badges are now listed in Alphabetical Order. Improved the height centering of numbers on the character sheet. Added a symbol to differentiate between items that are locked and items that are unusable. Re-centered buttons on the top drop-down menus. It is no longer possible to target yourself from the Group window of the Friends List when in a group. The weapon, armor, and resistance pop-up displays now display correct information, and inspecting players will now show correct damage when displaying weapons statistics. A player's "Maximum Health" in the character sheet is now simply called "health." Removed the rotation arrows from the My Character screen. Eyepatches will be removed from preview windows correctly. Players' Bank item count is now updated correctly when transferring to or from the shared bank. Stitched items will now show what the parent clothing items were when examining them. Ensured the "Board Enemy ship" Message does not cover any of the broadside combat buttons when in 800 x 600 resolution. The text for obtaining a Friendfinder code has been updated to display that the code must be used within 24 hours to both Pirate players, when generated. The inventory overflow and destroyed messages now display a little differently.

Sound Overall we’ve continued to polish and balance the sound in the game. Some notable fixes are as follows: Removed background music from the Flooded Cave in Monquista so only the spooky sound effects can be heard (unless engaged in combat) Sparkshooters now sound more like sparkshooters Added some new voices for a few MooShu Clan Lord and War Pigs. Kirin and Horse have hoof beats over stone now. The following Tutorial Tips have been added: First Travel when using the Go To Skull Island button. Nautical experience gains when your nautical level is greater than your player level. Maximum inventory size. Bank almost full. Shared Bank use. Fuel Boost button use. Refueling when you’re out of ship fuel. Initial combat rules on Skull Island. Equipping a house and using the housing interface. Fixed several voiceover and dialog mismatches. Specific quests adjusted are as follows: Much Mojo Trading Under the Table The Cunning Minx Soy Games Striking Beauty Toro Unleashed Peacemaker Be True To Your Sky The Claws of Justice Love's Locket Lost Redemption! Snake in the Grass The Shadow of the Paw The Monkey's Paw True Love Triumphs? North Wind Blows Flight of the Penguin Last But Not Least