I snagged and somewhat organized comments here and there from the boards. As a follow-up of this news.

—
It seems that my suggestion to look at Darniaq’s idea (“Class Blending” to offer progression above the level caps that doesn’t completely suck) was actually followed, or better, anticipated. This is how the “Champion Levels” are supposed to work:

– By visiting the king of the realm the players will start the journey through the “Champion Levels”.
– While on this journey the experience points coming from PvE and RvR (and both from new specific quests and RvR tasks) will represent the progress through these “Champion Levels”.
– These points will unblock five levels and as many specialization points.
– These five specialization points can then be spent between various “Champion” paths.
– The player will be able to choose if to spend all five points in just one path or spread them around.
– Each level will grant slightly more health/endurance/mana, depending on the class.
– Each path will grant the use of new skills/spells/abilities.
– The paths/skills are based on the starting archetypes but the player will have access only to the archetypes that aren’t at the origin of the character class.
– Finally the characters will become officially “Champions” and gain access to the “royal armory” where they’ll probably get the “Champion Weapon” quest-line along access to vendors (“purchase respec stones, unique weapon dyes, and other stuff”).

Basically this system is supposed to accomplish the exact same goal that ToA missed: open up, broaden the possibilities of each class without just stacking the powers.

In this case the design, from the few elements we have, has more hopes to center the objective. The fact that each class will gain powers directly coming from another is near to Darniaq’s idea of “Class Blending” and it basically works as a fix to one of the basic problems of the game that we already discussed:

I’ve been arguing a similar point for some time. I think Blizzard made a brilliant move by limiting the number of classes. EQ2 and SWG like DAoC and EQlive before them got into some sort of wierd overdesign mode where the developers thought more classes were better.

Not so. More classes just means more balance headaches at best, or marginalized classes at worst. They inevitably become super-specialized, and in ways that become boring for most players. Darwinized playstyles emerge. If a class/template is boring to play but deemed a requirement, it will be bot’ed. The developers can get pissed and ban players and cajole them and pay them off and invent new servers all they want, but they’re fighting a losing battle.

Don’t make boring classes. Anyone with a conscious can identify boring classes. Your players will. Better to do so before launch though.

Having a few classes that can do many things is better than having a zillion classes that can only do one.

The design principles on which these “Champion Levels” are based seem solid. Let’s hope that they do not screw the whole thing along the development because even ToA had wonderful premises that collapsed along the way thanks an awful planning and broken design.

But noone can spot the fun on this? Mythic resumed “precasting” from the old Ultima Online with the last Catacombs. Now what they do? They resume the tank mage! Now I wonder if their implementation of the Realm Invasion servers (I know, it won’t happen. But still..) will be close to the pre-Trammel age.

About the “Champion Quests”, quoting:
– “Champion Quests. These are going to be in 3 phases, presently undetermined as to how it is going to be separated. But will be able to be started at Level 30. The 2nd phase may be at Level 40 with Phase 3 being the Champion Levels at L50.”

About the “Champion Levels”, quoting:
– “Champion Levels. These will additional abilities that you will be able to get, but not as powerful as ML’s. Each Champion Level will give like a 50 HP increase or and increase to Power. etc… small things but will give the ability to work on Subclasses. Subclasses are being able to get abilities not normally available to you as a specific archtype. Example: A paladin would be able to get a low level Caster DD, or a Caster could spec in slash and be able to wear and use a sword. etc… certain things WILL NOT be allowed according to Mythic. Stealth, Speed, CC, Climb Walls, and several others will not be able to be Subclassed into. Completing each Champion Level will give one point to put into a subclass culminating to a total of 5 CL points. Titles will also be available at the completion of the Champion levels. Completing all CL’s will lead to getting the Champion weapon.”

About the “Champion Weapons”, quoting:
– “Champion weps-class specific, and there will be weps for each type that your class can use, bards and minstrels will have the option of champion instruments, Valks can get a sword or spear, 1 hander or 2 hander sword , etc. You will be able to trade in a champion wep whenever you want, if you happen to respec your character for example.”

About the Horses, quoting:
– “Horses-personal horses will be about as fast as skald/bard/minstrel speed, they *may* be useable in the frontiers, but not for combat. They are summoned like a puppy, and if you are attacked, you are knocked off the horse and it is unsummoned.”

“Completing CL’s and other undefined quests, will unlock different abilities of the horse. Saddlebags will be available for additional storage. There is also a plan to be able to name your own horse.”

“The basic horses will be available without buying the expansion.”

My comment -> From what I read it seems that the graphic quality and the animations look decent but I’m actually worried about the controls. If they develop this without building a specific system and just by putting the character on speed 5 and with an horse below the ass, it will be another screwup like the boats were in ToA: bugged, annoying, unusable.

About the new PvE zones/content, quoting:
– “Like the previous ones the new expansion brings new PvE contents dedicated this time for players of quite high levels (30 to 50). Indeed, the realms will call for their best inhabitants to deal with a rebellion which aim is to overthrow the sovereigns. No one knows who leads the plot and adventurers will thus have to unmask the enemy, find his territory and invade him to put an end to the threat. The invasion of this territory will not be simple and many epic battles will certainly come.

A few high level epic zones will also appear and will also be the place for group quests. They will of course ask you to venture in the adventure wings for some parts of these quests – giving to each one the occasion to become the hero of the adventure.”

“The next expansion will be based on each realms (Hib, Mid, Alb) is being “attacked” from within and is having his thone threatened. Players will talk to the king to start the process.”

“There will be 3 new zones total. One in each Realm. The concept art was not really shown for those zones and nothing really was stated as to where they were going to be. What was stated was that the zone will be where the 3rd phase of the Champion Levels will be.
There will also be an addition/change to each capital city. The King will be there… not sure specifically where, but will be there. The “doors that go nowhere” in Cammy Castle were mentioned and the devs got a strange look in their eyes when they were asked about them. They were very elusive about more on those doors.”

This can also hint that the graphic of the capital cities interiors will receive an update as it happened shortly after “Catacombs” with the exteriors.

—
There are also less optimistic news. It seems that the live development will slow down consistently. Only two patches (1.76 – 1.77) are planned before the release of this expansion at the end of the year. One in June and another in September. Quoting again:

1.76
– An update to the Guild Interface. Making guild management more accessible.

– Instituing a merit system. This will have several aspects, but will be a good way to try to keep people in a guild.

– Guild Banners. Usable in RvR. This was very interesting. Each banner has a different ability (ie. with it Abs buff, mez reduction, etc..) Only one banner can be in RvR/Guild at a time. However, if the banner holder dies, the banner falls to the ground and an enemy realm will be able to pick it up and take it back to their guild house and display it like a trophy. The specifics on how long the banner stays in one place before it can be picked up have not been difined yet, but were being worked.

– Guild Missions. Much like RvR missions, but guild specific.

– Guild Dues. A system to pay guild dues. Not much was discussed about this.

1.77
This update will be giving Classic Camelot a much needed rework. Specifics that were mentioned were updates to Epic Quests and Epic Armor. Making it worth wearing and doing the quests for. Updates to Classic high level areas. Updates to the dungeons. etc… Specifics were sketchy but lots of good things were discussed.

– Epics. The big downer on the Epics was that one would have to redo the epic quests from the beginning to get the new updated armor. However, the quests are being reworked so that everyone would be doing the same final quests for the armor.

– Many individual class bugs were discussed, too many to list, however, not many were new bugs not stated in TL reports.

– Talk about reducing the repair timer on razed towers was mentioned, and other thought on RvR. Some far fetched, some not so far fetched.

And finally another, long awaited, design fix:
“The devs are in the early stages of looking at a revamp of the durability/decay system for irreplaceable items, like the new epic armors (look for them in september), the champion weps, and artifacts. No details, but the implication seemed to be you wouldn’t have to worry nearly as much about durability loss on those items.”

At last. Three years to fix that stupid system.

—
All these infos are coming from the players present at the “Camelot Roundtable” that Mythic held in Washington D.C. this last weekend. From the sound of it, it seems that the development is still gliding on the surface and only marginally addressing the real problems of the game. If this is the roadmap till the expansion I cannot do anything but shake my head. That isn’t what the game needs. What’s in the patches and in the expansion isn’t bad, but it still should come after the basic level is fixed.

I see Mythic repeating the same mistakes of ToA. Developing content without planning and building the basement in advance.