Liberal Arts Major
This proved to be impractical for v3.0 for reasons that will soon become apparent (but not too soon!). Instead, I decided to localize all of these things in a particular section of the world, which is referred to in-game as The White City.
Get it?!
The White City consists of thirteen fields, most of which have something in them:
The Class Changer
The class changer is now no longer an NPC but an establishment on the order of the shop etc. It has largely the same functionality, with three differences:
1. The class system is now complete, so there aren't obvious gaps as there were before with e.g. the Bard/Dancer line having zero hybrids. I'll be addressing the alterations to classes Monday.
2. You no longer have to unequip everything to change classes. The class changer will do that for you, then go through everything that was unequipped in that way and try to equip it again.
3. Third classes now skip the middle step where you were asked to choose from a list with a single entry and instead go right to the change.
The Race Changer
In v3.0, all new characters start as Spirits. This is the catch-all race: the putty, if you will. The race changer can initially turn your Spirits into either Men or Elves, and there are plans to allow for an expansion of that functionality via artifacts.
The Shops
The shops were the main motivation for the creation of The White City. There are four of them - one for every character in your team - and each shop will display every available item that that character could possibly use. Tooltips go on to explain which of your characters can use that item. Consequently, any of these shops may take a few seconds to load.
For localized shops (a shop in Seahome, for example), NPCs will be used, and they will sell items unique to that location.
The Healer
The healer (Lost Pokemon Center Attendant or something along those lines in v.<3) has been moved here. There probably won't be one anywhere else.
The Tavern
The tavern remains functionally identical to its predecessors, except now you can't choose the race of a new character and the character limit has been changed. Now you can create new characters based on the number of quests you've completed - one for every two quests, rounded up - with a maximum of fifty (not including those in your party).
The Reflecting Pool
The Reflecting Pool fulfills the function of the Tavern, except for player characters instead of allies, using the same quest-based limiting mechanic. However, the maximum here is twenty-five instead of fifty.
There is now a slight practical difference between players and allies (as opposed to merely a behind-the-scenes difference): players get more stat points overall. This was done to sharpen the split between the two categories beyond what the game just happens to call them.
The Library
The Library is the most experimental of these things. It's the in-game "knowledge base": it remains in-character, if you will. This has been planned longer than any of the other features new to v3.0 on this list, but I still don't really know what to put in it, so naturally I've spent more time working on t3h gr4f1x than on the content.
t3h gr4f1x
Once the game is up and running, we'll look into more detail about how this particular section is doing.
Next up...
If I get an "article" up tomorrow, it'll probably be a short write-up regarding the changes to navigation. Otherwise, that will be combined into the above-mentioned article on classes (and levels and experience) projected for Monday.
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~ Ogordemir ~
"The sciences have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." ~ H.P Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu
Liberal Arts Major
Part of the fun is that I think most of my Summoner's Seal memory is from like v1, so I'm seeing a lot of this and going "Woah." and it's entirely possible it's not as different or new to me as it should be (but maybe it is!)
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xp1337: Don't you wish there was a spell-checker that told you when you a word out?
Liberal Arts Major
Most of this stuff wasn't present in v1 but only some things, like the Reflecting Pool and the Library, weren't in v.<3. It does look quite a bit different though.
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~ Ogordemir ~
"The sciences have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." ~ H.P Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu
Editor
Or is the character who's trying to change classes in that image already a Ninja, and capable of going to Shinobi (second tier) or... Ninja again, I guess?
For that matter, are Pirate/Druid/Initiate new class lines, or special classes that have been integrated into the main class changer? >_>
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"There's a pony in the shop, but don't buy it. It might do something unfortunate to you." ~from the first Summoner's Seal topic
Liberal Arts Major
This. I'll explain it more on Monday.
For that matter, are Pirate/Druid/Initiate new class lines, or special classes that have been integrated into the main class changer? >_>
New lines.
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~ Ogordemir ~
"The sciences have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." ~ H.P Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu
Message last edited by Ogordemir99 on 12/26/2009 at 09:36:55 PM
New Moderator
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"That was pretty interesting. But dropping a warship on me is cheating... Take it back!"-Id, Xenogears
Liberal Arts Major
Yes - the mechanics are not particularly complicated. In fact, they were basically all lifted from somewhere else. It plays like a standard turn-based (J)RPG.
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~ Ogordemir ~
"The sciences have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." ~ H.P Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu