Designing a successful open world MMORPG with full loot and avoiding common pitfalls.

This article is written for Darkfall Now blog . I will be updating it few more times so make sure to bookmark it.

You are putting years of work and millions of dollars on the line, so I am sure you can go extra mile and read this wall of text :)  .  Warning: Please be patient with this because my English is not as developed as my Java :-)

Note: I don't have time to finish this article which I started years ago. I didn't pick up RoA or DND after the demise of Darkfall Unholy Wars. There are other pressing needs in life entertainment is taking back seat. I will publish this unfinished version which still has value for new game developers.

Incidentally Ub3rgames been developing Darkfall New Dawn and many of their ideas matches what I wrote 2 years ago! 

Why I decided to write this article?

A very exciting time is ahead of us, with so many MMO featuring open world, full loot, in a sandbox setting that are to be released from single person indie to large established studios. I have been playing this type of games for many years starting with UO and most recently playing Darkfall.  Here few thing game designer should consider for long term success.

Lets Jump right into it.

An informal discussion with dev (developer, game designer, director, anyone making the game). "Dev: This is my vision and a game I always wanted to create..." which is all good and dandy but it may not be a game many people wants to play.

"Dev: I don't care because I am not trying to create a game for everyone.  I am creating a game that people have been asking for a long time".  Often times game developer can't distinguish between vocal minorities and silent majority. These vocal minorities often distorts reality in social media and developer loses insight of their target audience.  As a result they end up developing a product that is not sustainable.  You already know that game development and maintenance is super expensive so while a satisfying a niche market is ideal, but at the end of the day game still needs appeal to a crowed of 50,000+ paying customers. 

"Dev: Basically it sounds like you are telling us to develop the next World of Warcraft (theme park) and not take any risk".  No!  The market for theme park MMO is saturated.  You are better off buying hotdog stands and get better ROI then writing another theme park MMO. 

"Dev: Why bother reinventing the wheel when we already seen the perfect model that we can just copy from EvE, UO, SWG?."  This is a very good point.  Philosophy and game design used in these games were perfect for the time these games served but they will not necessarily work in current time. UO and SWG were pioneered and had very little competition.  Technology changed (broadband Internet, 3D graphics, etc), player expectation greatly shifted, and player are now exposed to a much wider range of Sandbox games (100 already in the market).  EvE Online is still going strong simply because over the years CCP kept up with the changing market and constantly evolving their game and business model to stay ahead of time.   (click read more)

Checkout New Darkfall from Ub3rgames

They have pretty big plans for Darkfall.

https://darkfallnewdawn.com/

In short read more on their site.

Our vision

Our aim is to take Darkfall Online and make it reach its potential as a complete empire building game where sandbox features and PvP are just tools to an end. We are not making a simulation or a gankbox, but are striving for meaningful choices and long term appeal. At its core, Darkfall is about risks versus rewards and accepting the consequences of one’s choices. Whether in combat, diplomacy or day to day activities.

Newbies Corner: Banegorge dungeon. Rare look at challenging PvE content in Darkfall.

Good

Message from the CEO regarding old version of Darkfall (aka DFO.)

Source: https://forums.darkfallonline.com/showthread.php?411080-Message-from-the-CEO

It gives me great pleasure to extend my sincere gratitude to all our players in large for their unswerving love and support for us. We are a small independent game developer, with a relentless drive for innovation and a spirit of grand imagination. We started our company in 2002. Back then, we knew we wanted to make great games that people would want to play for years.

We did not create this company to make money. Along the way, many things have changed at Aventurine. But, the core beliefs upon which we founded this company are stronger than ever: we are still a small independent game developer, with relentless drive for innovation and a spirit of grand imagination.

Darkfall Online (DFO) was launched in 2009. Three years later, in 2012, we launched its sequel -Darkfall Unholy Wars (DFUW). Based on popular demand, we contemplated at re-launching DFO. Slowly, we realized that DFO will not be delivering on our original product strategy. It also became clear that the problem is not just with DFO, but with our entire product strategy.

Now, better than ever, is time to make some hard decisions. We decided to kill all ongoing production for DFO, and focus on enhancing DFUW.

We realized, despite the initial excitement, players that played DFUW would not return to play DFO. Players were getting bored with the DFO game after a month or two. It is too hard to get into the game. The sad truth is that this is not a game that anyone would play for years.
Our dream is to create games that people will remember for many years to come. We want to build a company that will last for many years, too. A company whose employees will feel it is the best place they have ever worked.

Certainly, the aforementioned vision requires time to implement and patience to optimize. We are counting on all our players to support us during these times of great challenges. We are looking at building synergies with a partner that will not focus on the next ten years but on the next one hundred years.

It has been an exciting journey for our company, thanks to its dedicated and loyal players’ community. We can make our existing game -DFUW- much better. There is so much more we can do. More than anything, we cannot do it without our players’ wholehearted backing.

We are here today thanks to the confidence and trust our players have in us. Our objective is to become a company that every player can be proud of. That is a commitment we solemnly pledge to all of you.

Thank you so much,
Zad Mehdawi
Founder & CEO of Aventurine S.A.

Couple fights against Blacklist @ Erinthel

Implement crafting through recipe books & scrolls

This is my suggested changes that will have a significant positive impact in Darkfall.  This will add value to in-game activities like farming, exploration, and enhance the sense of progression among players.

 

Proposal: ALL craftable items are learnable ONLY from recipe scrolls/books that will drop from mobs, chest, treasure maps and they are tradeble, lootable.   These books can also be sold to NPC vendor for reasonable amount of gold.

This will allow AV to introduce hundreds of new items in the game that will be highly sought after. 

Implementation: Categorize these scrolls & books into common, non mastery, and mastery.

common: players may learn as many common recipes as they wish. (Doesn't require gold or prowess).




non-mastery: players may learn as many non-mastery recipes as they wish but it will cost gold.  More recipe a player learns, more expensive (exponentially) it gets to learn new non-mastery recipes.

mastery: players may learn as many mastery recipes as they wish but it will cost both gold and prowess.  Amount of gold and prowess needed will increase exponentially as they memorize more mastery level spells.



All new players will have all the first rank armor and weapon recipes memorized by default.

When a player first learns a new recipe they will have a 75% success rate.  The more they make the higher the success rate increases. 

A player may choose to "forget" a recipe.  Only prowess will be refunded.  If the player decided to pick up the same recipe they will start off from "75%" again.

A player doesn't need to "level up" their crafting anymore to create the next tier gear.  They just need to obtain the appropriate book or scroll. 

Each tier and style weapon will have separate books.  For example there will be  different books to cover militant, stoic, and barbaric Neithal Great Swords.




This system is essentially specialization and it will introduce trade offs, player dependency and encourage trading/player interaction.  All players will have much motivation to engage in game activities because they now have a chance to obtain recipe scrolls/books which they can learn, share, trade with other players or even sell it to vendor for gold.

Most epic siege in Darkfall Unholy Wars: Mar Shral defense by Lord of Death!

Amazing Group Coordinations Darkfall Filthy Irishman - Exe Fight video

New PvP video after balancing patch.

Fight Summary

• 12v12 Red Dragons/Anger Management
• 1v1 Valar
• 2v2 Bang Bros
• 2v2 Valar
• 2v3 (All different clans)
• 1v1 Anger Management
• 2v2 Red Dragons/Anger Management (Funny ending)

Elysian Fields re-visited Darkfall development team at Aventurine HQ for the 2nd time and returns with epic loots

Elysian Fields visited Aventurine last year and brought us tons of goodies.  This year Elysian had unfettered access and he snatched everything we wanted to know (with the much appreciated help of AV)  about the current and future of Darkfall!  Enjoy exclusive contents.

What Elysian Field wrote so far after the trip:




The A-Team!

From the Online games,movies,music and moreCommunity Facebook page Elysian Field wrote
...My (2nd) visit in AV (update) An epic day with amazing people is over. Right now I am editing all the info/pictures and more gathered for the community to enjoy. A huge thx to Axilmar,Hilderich,Acid D,Icy Bot Wave,Grimmic, Agron and ofc Ma$$ for the amazing interview (approximately 1 hours 30min of communities questions answered...I have no words). I hope to have everything ready by tomorrow or max Thursday so that you all can be part of all I have witnessed!....

....Elysian confirming

Icy Wave is not a  bot!

Part 1: A special surprise for the community.

Part 2:

Dev Question and Answer part I (video 2 linked after transcript)

.
It is best to just listen to the 2 hour video. Summary transcript of the first video. I apologize in advance for bad compilation, omission, and taking words out of context.
Elysian: Good morning to all their community and I have in front of me Darkfall devs and I'm ready to make an interview, so (dev) please introduce yourselves


Elysian:So I would like to ask some question to about to quests and when it will be released.

More or less in next few months. Right now system is tested. Right now main issues is (need more) content so we are holding it.

Elysian:Are we going to to have a daily quests, well-planned quests or party quests

Mass: First batch of quest will be player quest and will add other type later.

Elysian:Question will not be link to weaken dungeon bosses?

Mass: the quest system support that but up to quest designer to decide that.

Elysian:Because as a casual player I would really love that and be linked with the daily quest.

Not the first batch but we have the flexibility. They can add Dungeon bosses if they want.

Elysian:Will you put some limits (score board) and so that people for example can not pick you party members or clan members to "trade" kills.

Dev: System in place for diminishing returns so more time you do the same (kill) the less point you will get

Dev Not based on straight kills

Elysian:Somebody was asking about some DF1 old statistics, village capture, etc.


We want to bring back as much as possible.We already capture all the (activity) logs so we can add it in future which will include previous stats.

Elysian:Tell us about trial mode, limitation, etc.

Several restrictions in place place, including maximum harvest, backpack, prowess, can't use market.

Elysian:Can join clan?

Can join clan but can't create clan. Can't capture territorial objects. No restriction on relic (it came after original design).

Elysian:Any books or comics you used to make the quests?

There is Darkfall lore that no one knows about and there is history. We want to introduce (via quest system) what happened in DF1 and DFUW.

Elysian:There will be NPCs?

Some by NPC some by discovery.

Elysian: What will it offer to vets?

Unique items will be given by quest.

Quest is about learning and acquiring (fluff) items.

We don't want to duplicate what feat system does (in terms of reward).

Quest will be optional not needed for pvp or dev of char.

Elysian:I'm not satisfied with feat rewards, they suck, dungeon boss rewards sucks, killing dungeon boss needs to be daily activity. You need to reorganize because people do not do any of these activities.


Dev: We know that already. That will be our next re balancing patch (2 patch later).

We will change prowess, skill, restructure feats.

A lot more variety monster. Move away from feat, but more based on mobs difficulty to get prowess.

We already have 2 dungeon linked to quest. A quest may lead you to dungeon.

We will have filler quest. Main purpose of quest is to answer why things are the way they are. For example why we have a goblin spawn in area x.

Elysian: Where is religion why you call it on holy wars and there is no religion in game

We will hear soon about religion. The ultimate lore. We won't call it religion. More on that in upcoming announcement.

We got to design alignment system but need to plug all the hole first. This same system can be used for faction or religion. ON TOP OF THAT PLAYER CREATED FACTIONS.

3 Months at least for any kind of alignment system.

Elysiano you plan on expansion?

NO.

No new dungeon. No golem dungeon.

Elysian:Any special for returning players before Easter?

We have plans for loyalty system that rewards for being active and for example they will receive Seletine gold or something like that.

Elysian:Any plan for free weekend?

We have a lot of promotional plans. For example in April we have 2nd anniversary.

With trial we can promote the game better. We have already have video, social sites, etc. Once game has better NPE, it will be ready for trial.

We can't make any promise about the new armor. You have to talk to "Steve"

Elysian:How about Darkfall 2010 models?

It is very time consuming for arts. They are looking for ways to shorten it. Whole art dept will be blocked. We need racial attributes before model. It will not take 6 months but will not be easy like 1 month.

We have other important changes before DF2010 model like rebalancing, recipe, etc.

We have to tie everything together first. For example before enchanting, we need to fix all the weapons.

There are other things in pipeline that will get closed if art dept is reserved for models. We want them in, but can't fit them in.

Skills will be more expensive and an investment.

We have a very specific goal to turn DF into a MMO(RPG). Not to allow everyone to excel in everything. You will have to make a decision (specialization) on what skills you want to take which will dictate.

Elysian:Are you planning to return to DF1 pvp feeling?

What exactly? Not going to have every skill available. One idea is we may change common skill so it becomes a separate school and free up slots. First we have to make every skill equally desirable before we open up for more skill slots. Even xfer should be same as regular skills. You have to fight over which skill you want.

Elysian:Any plans of changing village timer into player driven activity?

We want all timers to go away. We want to focus more on strategic meta game around dominion. Dominion will be generated over capture and hold. About village timers and timers in general we want to completely move away from timers. Not going back to naked stealing. Clans to maintain holding and up keep cost via material and dominion.

Elysian:How to make game less tedious?

Change harvesting, capacity changes to nodes, and want to minimize time to get combat ready. We will implement crafting queue. Also change crafting timers. Harvesting tool will extract specific resource for enchanting. We will also distribute all base materials. Farming and harvesting more active. More about getting out into the world.

Basic idea is you have to keep moving for harvesting.

Utility and diversity is important. Any plan to allow special crafting that can be use in PvP. Application of food and potions will be reevaluated.

The section below which starts from 35 min in video #1 can't be translated well. This is just my interpretation. (NOT EXACT TRANSLATION)

Main thing about skill is we want a broader population to participate. 90% of the population does everything from trading, harvesting, crafting apart from PvP. We have 10% elite solders loves attacking, defense, pirating. We want combat not affect that 90% in a singular way. Meaning we want the 90% and 10% to have a better inter-dependency where they will need each other.

A new player will normally never be equal to someone who played 2 months. Balance will only happens (in a MMORPG) if they both took same path and made same choices. This is Role playing game where you are choosing to play a particular role. If we all wanted was absolute balance (fair fight) we could just reduce Agon to one tile (and remove the whole open world unrestricted concept) and not bother creating a full blown MMORPG.

Elysian:Any plan to reduce bank/chaos bank?

Yes we already did it.

When we rebalance armor and weapon we will make everything equal. We might downgrade metal and leather to 5 pieces.

We want to add more mix and match.

Elysian:Possible to have 3rd person view for bolt?

It can be fixed but tech issue.

Elysian: dfrocks ask every week a new MMO with open world and full is coming out. How do you plan to differentiate?


Free aim combat. (There is a lot of talk about Crowfall seasonal reset, and we are exploring that if that might fit DF.)

Elysian:How to get more conflict?

More sinks, localization, loot boxes, ships, harvesting changes will make more players cross each other path.

Elysian:How do you get feedback from those who don't play?

Patch, make trailer, change direction, etc.

Elysian:What is the plan with Steam platform?

We are going to update Steam profile. First we need to fix the game. After free trial, and some few mandatory changes. 2 ~ 3 specific changes needed before thinking about massive Steam promotion. On boarding process needs to change because people come from many different type of games.

Cash shop can't sustain this game unless it is created/designed ground up.

Elysian:What are the challenges in creating siege engine?

Resource and time consuming. Right now the game needs more fundamental systems before siege engine.

Elysian:Any change of reducing mats and in exchange reduce dura?

We are looking into it. It might be armor that breaks faster.

Elysian:Immortal. Will you fix stacking, CC, etc

When we revisit all skills.

Elysian:Why all of a sudden reducing tower damage, etc when these action should have been done long time ago?

Game is not bleeding players because of towers.

Elysian:Plan to introduce new way to kill high tier mobs?

We want new ways monsters to kill players! Monster will go "enrage" mode if not killed after certain time. Monster harder to kill but easy for monster to kill players. Some of your skills will be worthless against certain monster.

Elysian:Will you stop patching and go back to old ways?

We will patch when needed and ready. Normal patches can't be done more freq than once a month due to a very time consuming process.

Elysian:Any plan to change the siege system.

Like we said the siege system Dominion

Elysian:Any plan to revert back to DFO combat?
There were many problem with DFO combat. Problem with RPG element and everyone can do everything. This doesn't fit what we are trying to achieve.

Elysian:You are introducing old skills. Will you introduce more?
We are open to introducing new skills from DFO. There are other side effects so we have to be cautious.      

Part 3: Dev Question and Answer part II

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Transcript from Video #2

It is best to just listen to the 2 hour videos. Summary transcript of the second video. I apologize in advance for bad compilation, omission, and taking words out of context.


Elysian:we continue with the questions

Elysian:most common questions between the vets or inactive players.
I'm from Windmilll from Europeans server and inactive due to multitude reasons.
The reasons for me is I have nothing to do. I have all gold, all prowess, full bank nothing else left for me to do. How do you plan to change this? Are there some plans for more content the for vets. Any plan so see near future an overhaul of village, housing, vendors, etc. Solution to full bank issues?

Crafting, recipe changes will add sinks. Exploring free placement of houses. A lot of system in place didn't take account of free placement houses. It is more then building lego modules. Has to do with siege, protection, safe zone, multitude of systems. We want to do free placement when everything else is done. Just had some preliminary design nothing concrete.

Darkfall politics is 100% player made. No way to implement diplomacy. We want to add that with rules and benefit. We want to do that with Dominions.Vessels system can go to diplomacy system.

Elysian: What will you add in next 3 months that will make people will return.

We have pvp changes in place, enchanting and economics. We can give fluff armor something to achieve. The idea is slowly replace everything that gives you free loot into something you have to invest money and time to get more out of it. Who ecosystem of supply, demand, logistics, trade needs to be enrich.

Elysian:What will happen to old resources?

They will still be used but will start to drain.

Elysian:Will they (old mats) be used in new recipe?

No. No need for people to panic and start selling house, deeds, etc.

In economic sense they will no longer be vets. Everyone will have (soft) reset through old resource will be deprecated .

First we need to tighten things up. Once we have a good economy and people will feel like farming the we can move forward.

We need upkeep system and we can maybe have farmer that grows crops or raise cows. Then we will have reason to have 150+ people clan.

Elysian:How about alignment system?

We gave basic design to coders. It will be a bit more complicated then the old system. The basic mechanism is you will have consequences when red. The idea is if you become red you will have specially "perks" towards other red. If you go red goo all the way red! If you go blue go all the way to reap benefit of blue. You can be grey. There will be market implications.

Three thing about alignment system. The flagging system. Tie it to AoI. Different effect in different area. 3rd one is benefit and disadvantage apply to you.

Elysian:Will Dwarf return?

We talked about a model in the past. Return to the Dwarf might be up to the player through Quest system. Possible spoilers so AV Dev didn't want to elaborate on it.

Elysian: Xipher asked if AV plan to change siege game?

We answered that. How player will capture village, etc.

Elysian:When will alignment come out?

At least 2 month. It is being evaluated by coders.

Elysian:What is coming next?

Economy, end gear, distribution of mats,

Elysian:Free trial?

Possibly Alignment, Trial, Quest all in one patch 3+ months.

Enchanting is next month.

Elysian:ETA on R70 armor?

We are not planning to add new armor. It will change the game too much. We are half way there not a priority.


Elysian:Will screaming be back?

We are planning to change voice to every race. Male and female will have different voice. Its in the pipeline but can't tell exact ETA.

Elysian:Kasmos asked what is our plan for economy and drive conflict? What new mats introduce to game?

Having 2 different usage for each by product will be the solution. For example Alch byproduct used in Eng, etc. We will try to add new materials. All pots needs to be useful including food.

We need to talk about upkeep for resources. Like power that needs to be connected and secured for clan holdings to be functioning. Way to transport power.

People don't need to badger us when we will patch. When time comes we will patch. Asking it won't speed it up.

A lot of new materials coming.

Elysian:Who is most skill player?

The QA guys are most skill player.

Elysian:What is happening to upcoming 3 new school?

Right now we will not touch school before we change skills. We won't be thinking in school since we open up. We will be adding individual skills.

Elysian:Additional Seletine shop ideas? I don't like first few masks.

We do have ideas. We want to introduce them with content. More fluff with more real content. No more flooding with fluff item.

Shop items are not primary concern of Art team or ours.

Elysian:Livikore any plans to change assets damage works. Any plans for guards?

We want to add options for clan to customize infrastructure. We need to work on that.

Elysian:My clan is asking about guards.

We have mechanism in place, but for now it is not a target. It involves a lot of coding. For instances easier to ask more types of towers than AI guards.

Elysian:What is the plan on banks with different permission level?

Jon Mass has done some work. Part of the regional banking will deal with it. We need some more meeting with coders to discuss this.

Elysian:New kind of weapons? Energy / soul item? Tabards? Clan title? Personalization? Banner? Flags?

It will require a lot of art assets which is a bottleneck. No siege weapon. Mounted combat will be standalone. Nothing in the pipeline.

Part of re balancing is leaving enough room for new items.

Elysian:Any progress on monster AI? Hiring any AI coder?

Send you CVs! We haven't fully explored with our existing AI before adding more addition.

Elysian:Balance Dread and Imperious?

We could add penalty and we will introduce set bonus.

Elysian:Booster are you going to remove?

We are removing it completely

Elysian:Fix under water bug where arrow goes wrong place?

It is a camera code issue. We know what is wrong, we might fix it next, next patch.

Elysian:Any news about casual/solo players?

We are talking about a "championship" type system. Find friend and pvp. Only in idea phase.

Elysian:Will you introduce where new player learns PvP, train area, etc

Alignment system that works only within NPC city walls.

The more we tie in prowess to skills, the more we add skills to non combat area which will add new play style.

When we increase cost of skills, it will open up new opportunity for more players to be useful.

Elysian:Small clan are in disadvantage with change to mastery crafting, etc. Causing them to zerg.

This is a issue with trade not working. Also localization will prevent a clan to zerg everything. Small clan have better chance to capture and control areas of importance.

Elysian:What you plan to do with clan browser that is broken. Showing bunch of 1 player clan.

Fix UI which shows only active clans. Also if clan is inactive for a period of time, remove them.

Elysian:More world bosses?

No. We might upgrade existing mobs.

Elysian:Thank you very much. Your input were valuable.

We want to thank everyone for putting their time. We love your passion even if you don't like us and call us retards !

 

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Chaos refineries suggestion for Nethal mats

One fundamental issue with Darkfall is that almost everything can be crafted inside a holding once a player gathers all the materials.   This have negative impact on the game because players don't need to travel. This mechanism is counter intuitive for an open world game which should encourage players to be out in the world.

In order to increase game activity, travel and exploration, I suggest AV removes ONLY

Neithal Ingot
Neithal Cloth
Neithal Wood
Neithal Leather

processing from ALL clan crafting stations.  Neithal materials needs to be processed through chaos refineries listed below that are strategically placed. These chaos refineries shouldn't be confused with chaos crafting stations.  They can't craft anything else.

This will complement loot regionalization which is also being design to encourage players to travel and be in the open world.  AV should also reduce many of redundant chaos banks listed in here by Xpiher.

As you can see below, these refineries will overlap many region and will fuel conflict as players from different clan will likely to run into each other.

Darkfall Alberworth Mega siege

Darkfall Unholy Wars - Christmas patch day PvP

Darkfall End of the Year event "Silent Fright... Unholy Blight...."

Snowpiercer

Relic system released to push Clan warfare into new heights

 What will you do with your Relic?

Relics may spawns randomly in any location.

In today's patch Darkfall introduced 9 persistent relics that spawns randomly in the world.  When a player finds it, he/she may bring it back to their clan holdings to get a clan wide global buff  or he/she may destroy the relic at specific alter to receive an individual powerful heroic buff known as "The Immolator".

Relics are unique object they can't be removed from the world by player action such as logging out or storing them in a bank, bag, etc.  Player also can't instantly move the relic with recall, port out or through summon mechanism. The player must transport on land or sea! Below is the official explanation of the Relic System.

Here is the official Relic demo video.

{Objectives
Based on the community feedback and our own thoughts, we designed a system with three primary objectives:

•     Increase clan holding value.
•     Promote clan holding raiding.
•     Introduce a player driven capture the flag type of activity.

The mechanic
The basic operations that outline the mechanic are the following:

•     Nine (more later) relics randomly and mysteriously appear around Agon.
•     A player that discovers a relic can use it to load it up on his back through a channeling action.
•     The pack is visible on the players back and emits a special effect as well.
•     Players carrying relics cannot recall in any way, use mounts or sprint (Considering blocking movement skills as well).
•     Players carrying relics can be transported by vehicles as usual.
•     A relic can be dropped voluntarily or if the player carrying it is killed or disconnects.
•     Players can carry the relic to any clan holding church and use the altar inside to place it there.
•     Clan members that control a holding with a relic, receive a global buff.
•     If the church is disabled the buff is disabled until the church is repaired to above 25%.
•     If the Church is reduced to rubble the relic is also destroyed and it reappears at a random location again.
•     The relic can be removed from the alter by any player as long as the holding asset protection is inactive.
•     Relics can also be carried to a demonic altar where they can be destroyed, granting the player that destroyed them a prowess reward (Considering some special limited time buff as well).
•     Destroyed relics reappear at a random location again.

Clarifications
A relic only exists in the world, carried on a players back or in a church. It cannot be placed in a backpack or bank or removed from the world in any other way apart from the ones described above, whereupon it will respawn at a random location.

In that vein, dropping a relic means it will actually appear where it is dropped allowing for a hasty escape or for hiding a relic in a remote area only to divulge the information of its location to the highest bidder.

Also, each church can only hold one Relic but clans can take advantage of multiple relics by having multiple holdings with churches. }

This new relic system jolted existing clan / meta game. Clans now have strong incentive to conquer more holding from rival clans, so that they can store more relics and get multiple (stack) buffs.  Smaller clans now have reason to consolidate and join forces to participate in the relic system.

Relic system encourages players to explore and find relics in the wild and bring it home safely through team work and careful planning.  Clans now have a purpose to raid rival holdings to find and steal relics and bring it home.  City defense is also equally important to safeguard relic from raiders and bandits.

Relic system increased the depth of planing, strategy and logistics by many folds. A clan that wants to excel through resource or warfare are now given the avenue with the introduction of the relic system.

Relic system is essentially driving Darkfall players into large scale warfare, territorial control with economical dominance. 

Here are the 9 relics introduced.

Relic of Warfare
Decreases Siege Ladder spawning time to 10 seconds, delays enemy city warning message by 20 seconds and grants +5 arcane protection

Relic of Greed
Halves Globules of Greed consumption and doubles requisitioning speed

Relic of Aegis
Increases the damage absorbed when blocking and increases penetration damage against enemies who block.

Relic of Gluttony
Doubles food duration and halves potion cool down timers.

Relic of Deception
While crouching, increases movement speed, hides player information and silences archery attacks and movement.

Relic of Alacrity
Boost your clan mates Health and Stamina!

Relic of Avidity
Boost your clan mates Mana and Stamina!

Relic of Ability
Boost your clan mates Health and Mana!

Relic of Hearth and Home
Help your clan mates get home quickly!


Alternatively, players who discover a relic can sacrifice it at the Altar of Immolation located somewhere beneath Nurenfau and claim the title and unique buff of the Immolator.

Altar of Immolation

The Immolator

• Grants 4000 Health, 800 Mana and 800 stamina.
• Hits are always critical.
• All healing effects are only 10% effective.
• Recalling with runes is blocked.
• Dash skill is blocked.

Lasts for six hours or until the Immolator is killed

Here is a video of first Immolator killed by players!

Aventurine S.A. has done  a great job by bringing in a CTF (Capture the flag) type system into a sandbox environment. This enhanced existing game by giving players new tools to shape their game world politically, economically and militarily.

Daedrus' Tales update June 20th

If you love to read head to Daedrus' Tales. This is a dedicated blog for high quality player made Darkfall lore! Click on each image to read the stories behind them!

The Seven Legends of Bloodscar : When the black tower rose 

out of the Moldar Plains at the behest of the powerful

Opus of the Traitor (Traitor Series: Part IV) : Ruins 

and a graveyard. I'll admit I was rather

UI Suggestion and Feeback for Dev Part 2

Here are some more concept design submitted by user to improve Darkfall UI. See Part 1 here.

Here is the forum discussion talking about these UI.

Ragnarok Del presenting this Wire frame.

Key binding and other UI suggestion by World Dominator binding suggestion

World Dominator suggested  these changes to world maps

World Dominator presented this cleaned up
add friend Window.

Health/Int/Stamina Bar suggestion by World Dominator

Make current Bars straight.  See top of the picture by Naglfar Yotunov

UI Improvement suggestion for developers

Here are few Darkfall UI improvement suggestions to the Dev team. Click on each picture to enlarge it. Dev please check Part 2 as well. Players contributing a lot of effort in that one also.




Portal Tab Needs to be separated.  Move the "Register" and "Option"
buttons below.



A loading progress bar will assure client didn't crash and how long
to wait. 

Steam user playing Darkfall should register with AV to get Tech Support, Official Forum, Seletine Gold, etc

All Steam users playing Darkfall should register with Aventurine (AMS) so that you can get full Tech support, privilege to post in official forums, and purchase Selentine Gold for fluff items.  You can also play Darkfall directly without using Steam.  Also when AV gives out special gifts and offers you can redeem them in your AMS account.

Registering with AV (AMS) is easy.

1) Run Darkfall client from Steam and click "REGISTER"

click on Upper Right corner

2) Fill it out with accurate and truthful information because you can't change once you submit.

Once you finish registration you can now access AMS by going here https://ams.darkfallonline.com/AMS/ to buy Seletine Gold for fluff items, Play Darkfall directly without steam, link official forum account, etc.

You can also get customer support from https://cs.darkfallonline.com/

How to stop Steam from taking screen shots when playing Darkfall

By default Steam bind "i" key to take Screen Shots.  This key is also used in Darkfall to bring up Roles overview.  Also you will type i multiple times in chat as "i" is an English Vowel.

There are multiple ways to fix this. 

1) Exit out of Darkfall
2) Open Steam
3) Go to Steam Settings

4) Choose In-Game
5) You can either "uncheck" Steam Overlay or Change Screenshot shortcut keys to something Darkfall doesn't use. For example "ctrl+\"

6) Restart your computer. (Restarting Steam will also work)

Special thanks to a player for sending me these screen shots and instructions.