Greetings Friends! As you can tell, the less news on or from Shroud of the Avatar and Portalarium, the more I will do these updates for you on a biweekly basis.  This week we have Release 61 news, Quarter 1 of 2019 news, and more.  Thank you all as well who were in our comments section 2 weeks ago, on the previous article. Your feedback, thoughts, and comments are always greatly appreciated.  So without further ado, here is what we have this “Update of the Avatar’:

• Release 61 Live
• Quarter 1 of 2019 Schedule Update
• Thoughts on Quarter 1  of 2019 Schedule Update

Release 61 Live

Release 61 released December 13 with the following highlighted changes:

• More Fishing updates
• Krampus
• Teleport to Scene Scrolls
• Ornate Vile Longbow
• “Tabula Rasa”  book so Players can do a Character Respec
• More Player Dungeon Rooms & Hallways
• R58 Livestream Items
• R61 QA Testing Incentive Winners
• More Bug Fixes

Release 61 Player Instructions

Release 61 Known Issues

The respec book appears to be something that allows players to respec and get 100% of their experience back.  Starr stated in the R61 Instructions that they “are experiencing a delay in delivering the complimentary Tabula Rasa book so we are also not making it yet available on Crown Merchants. ” This is a good quality of life addition that I hope they keep.  Check out some of the other other smaller fixes and changes in the Player Instructions forum post.  Sadly no major changes to things like the quest system, UI, incomplete Episode 1 areas that I am told are still labeled as “under construction”.

Quarter 1 of 2019 Schedule Update
As always Starr Long posts schedule updates in the forum and typically they eventually post them to the updates section of the SotA home page.  Here is the update from him, looking at Quarter 1 of next year:

Forum Post by Starr Long:

Greetings Avatars,

2018 was a fantastic year for Shroud of the Avatar! We moved out of Early Access in March and Collector’s Boxes shipped in Q3! We made serious progress on improvements to quality of life and fixed huge numbers of bugs! In the final quarter of 2018 alone we added Player Made Dungeons, Fishing Phase 2, Pumpkin Head, and Krampus! Q1 of 2019 is going to kick us off with a bang! Envy Angel (another seasonal boss), more expansions to the Player Made Dungeons, Back Slot Item Stats, Fertilizer for Agriculture, Episode 2 kickoff, Baby Dragons and more polish!

2019 will of course culminate with Episode 2 which will have a new story, new lands, a revamp of the Quest and Journal system, a Theater System, Treasure Hunting with treasure maps that show up as loot, Item Affinity, Taming system expansions, Customizable NPCs, and expanded permissions for containers and doors!

As we have stated previously, we intend to publish quarterly schedule updates detailing our monthly releases and those monthly releases will continue just as before, on the last Thursday of each month. Even though the goals outlined in these schedules are likely to change somewhat as we react to feedback, we feel it is important to periodically provide you with an updated roadmap.

Our priority continues to be to deliver new content to our players regularly, so that you can give us feedback that will help us iteratively improve Shroud of the Avatar. This collaborative process continues to benefit the game, and often results in sweeping changes such as the recent balance passes to combat. As you have seen in previous releases, the flexibility inherent to this process means that we sometimes push things out, but we also often pull new things in.

Q1 Top 10 Priorities: As mentioned previously we keep a running list of our Top 10 priorities at all times that we use when building our schedule and prioritizing where to allocate our team’s resources. We often refer to it when making decisions about the project. While it has a VERY strong influence on what we work on at any given time, it does not mean that we only work on something that is on the list. It just means that if someone can assist with something that will help address an item on the list, then we will make sure they do that first before working on anything else. Sometimes team members cannot assist with anything on our top priorities, so they work on other tasks such as visual polish, combat balance, or content that helps us raise funds. Q1 will focus on lots of polish including systems, user interface, bug fixing, loot, performance, as well as continued improvements to quality of life. We will also expand the Agriculture and Player Made Dungeon systems, add another seasonal boss, and prepare for Episode 2 development.

1. Quality of Life: Midway through Q3 2018 we shifted focus to general improvements to quality of life by starting to remove slowdowns and annoyances in gameplay. We will continue this effort in Q1 2019.
2. Systems Polish: Polishing and improving existing systems will continue to be a major focus of Q1. This will take priority over new systems.
3. Bug Fixing: We will continue to focus more on fixing bugs versus new content and new features.
4. Performance: While the game is much more playable now we feel there is still more to be gained so in Q1 we will continue making code and content changes to improve performance.
5. User Interface Polish: In Q4, we polished various UI elements and we will continue to do so during Q1.
6. Seasonal Content: Content to support Spring events (Valentines and Easter) will be created.
7. Improved Reward Cycle: Q1 will continue our focus on systemic and game-wide upgrades to the quality and quantity of loot.
8. Agriculture & Player Made Dungeons: Some of the work we did with Fishing Phase 2 will now allow us to expand the Agriculture system with Fertilizer. We will also continue to add new features and content to the Player Made Dungeons feature.
9. Shipping Phase 2: Collector’s Boxes will start shipping to those who did not get theirs in the first round.
10. Episode 2 Kickoff: We will prepare for the commencement of Episode 2 development in Q2.

As always, all dates, durations, and deliverables are subject to change as we adjust our designs based on direct feedback from you, our players.

RELEASE 62, January 31, 2019

• Performance: Performance work will mainly focus on improving frame rate and reducing hitching during gameplay. Work will also continue to be done on load time reduction on the few outstanding scenes that are not meeting our 15-second load time target.
• Bug Fixing: Time will be allocated to a general sweep through all systems, features, and content to reduce overall bug counts.
• Combat: After a millennium of being unable to produce offspring dragons are finally reproducing! Baby Dragons have been sighted in various remote locations across Novia. Don’t be fooled by their size though! They are still dangerous beasts, even when young! We will also do some balance work on pet balance including summons and tamed creatures.
• Crafting & Economy: Back slot items (cloaks, wings, backpacks, etc.) will now be able to have stats, enchantments, and masterworks associated with them.
• Player Towns & Player Housing: Updates to Dynamic Player-Owned Towns (POTs) that have locked submission forms will appear in the game.
• Livestream and Seasonal Content: We will add recent livestream stretch goal items and 2019 Valentine items.
• 

RELEASE 63, February 28, 2019

• Story: You may have heard of Cupid… but have you heard of the Envy Angel?
• Performance: Performance work will mainly focus on improving frame rate and reducing hitching during gameplay. Work will also continue to be done on load time reduction on the few outstanding scenes that are not meeting our 15 second load time target.
• Bug Fixing: Time will be allocated to a general sweep through all systems, features, and content to reduce overall bug counts.
• Combat: A new polearm type will become available: Pronged weapons! This includes Tridents and Pitchforks.
• Crafting & Economy: Fertilizer will now be able to be used in Agriculture to affect the outcome.
• Player Towns & Player Housing: Updates to Dynamic Player-Owned Towns (POTs) that have locked submission forms will appear in the game.

RELEASE 64, March 28, 2019

• Story: The first lands associated with Episode 2 will begin to appear!
  
• Performance: Performance work will mainly focus on improving frame rate and reducing hitching during gameplay. Work will also continue to be done on load time reduction on the few outstanding scenes that are not meeting our 15-second load time target.
• Bug Fixing: Time will be allocated to a general sweep through all systems, features, and content to reduce overall bug counts.
• Crafting & Economy: Upon achieving Grandmaster in a crafting school you will now unlock a set of new exclusive effects for Masterworking and Enchanting.
• Player Made Dungeons: More features and content will be added to the Player Made Dungeon System including the ability to place creatures to fight in your dungeon!
• 
• Player Towns & Player Housing: Updates to Dynamic Player-Owned Towns (POTs) that have locked submission forms will appear in the game.
• Livestream and Seasonal Content: We will add recent livestream stretch goal items and 2019 Easter items.
• 

We continue to be incredibly thankful for the support we receive from this amazing community. While the financial support you provide makes all of this possible, it pales in comparison with the faith you have in us, the feedback you provide us, and the content you are making for everyone to enjoy. We are humbly grateful, and we are always excited to see you each month in New Britannia!

And remember Q1 is just a warmup for the rest of 2019 which will be an amazing year for Shroud of the Avatar players! We have much more planned including Crafting Specializations (choose your effect when Masterworking and Enchanting), more expansions to the fishing system, and more boss improvements. 2019 will of course culminate with Episode 2 which will have a new story, new lands, a revamp of the Quest and Journal system, a Theater System, Treasure Hunting with treasure maps that show up as loot, Item Affinity, Taming system expansions, Customizable NPCs, and expanded permissions for containers and doors!

Sincerely,
Starr Long
Executive Producer
Shroud of the Avatar

 

Thoughts on Quarter 1  of 2019 Schedule Update

As we are far enough from release, it is always good to see what the future plans are for any online game.  In various social circles, especially on discord, this is always a topic of discussion. We cover so many games from Elder Scrolls Online, World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy XIV…  to even Fallout 76, Magic the Gathering Arena, and many others.  We analyze update posts from social media and various forums.  I always enjoy the counter arguments to me from certain few people.  Portalarium posts are their way of doing a sort of “here is our plan” for backers and players to see.  It inevitably comes up in these same discussions. And so here are a few thoughts that have come up.

As you can tell from their top 10 priorities, they have no plan to complete Episode 1 zones that are incomplete.  They also appear to have no plan to overhaul the UI.  Their main focus appears to be polish what they do have, make more addon store items, and Episode 2.  We also have a new map that shows a few of the new land pieces for Episode 2. Let’s look at it again…

However, as you can see, this graphic doesn’t match the benefactor logo.  I assume this is because they are just showing off the overall basic idea of these land masses and comparing them to what land masses we have so far.  It was brought up by one individual that the “snake shape”, while keen, is implausible as a land-form. Not that this hasn’t stopped any gaming dev team from running with things, because “it is a fictional world”.

Based on what we see so far, combined with the fact that January is almost here, hopefully the devs have learned from Episode 1 and won’t go too large with scale. The lack of completeness of so much content in Episode 1 has been a detriment to the game and like some other recent games, sets a bad precedent that incomplete and unfinished games are somehow okay to release and call “complete”.  However, I could see certain current players who would complain about it if they didn’t go as big of a scale as Episode 1.  Addition (12/17/18 11:31 PM): Was reminded that each episode was supposed to double the landmass. So again if they fail to follow through on that, people will be upset. If they don’t reduce scope to improve quality, people will be upset too.

Starr also talks about how 2019 will “culminate with Episode 2 which will have a new story, new lands, a revamp of the Quest and Journal system, a Theater System, Treasure Hunting with treasure maps that show up as loot, Item Affinity, Taming system expansions, Customizable NPCs, and expanded permissions for containers and doors!”  I honestly am disappointed by the lack of any completing of Episode 1, fixing the UI, and other major issues.  The lack of “bandwidth” on their end probably is why they have the streamlined focus they do.   I also see regularly on social media and the forums that the only content some people request is vanity content instead of story content.  I wonder if this Based on the specifics of what the devs will be working on with each release mentioned, it is interesting to note that no new content for Episode 2 is being worked on, as it looks to be kicked down the road to Quarter 2 of 2019. My concern for Episode 2 will be lack of content and quality.