Design Notes

March 01, 2013

Death Pits / Dage's Birthday!

The Death Pits Await You!

Chaos Lord Lionfang is still searching for the one item that might serve as a weapon against Chaos and he's letting nothing stand in his way. He has discovered that the Darkblood relic called the Tears Of The Mother has been hidden at the bottom of the Darkblood Death Pits and now it's a race to reach the relic. 

Since the beginning of history the various Darkblood tribes of Thunderforge waged war with each other for the precious Rotstone mines which became known as the Death Pits. They would toss their captives down into the poisonous mines and work them to death. 

Once the tribes came together and built Falguard, uniting all the Darkblood under one Primarch, they continued the practice sending out slavers to capture humans, horcs and other creatures to do their mining for them. 

Now the Death Pits are haunted by the memories of a thousand, thousand lost souls. The walls and floors are littered with the bones of the dead (and undead). This dark, bleak hole in the earth is where the Primarch has hidden the Tears of the Mother and sent Logash to protect them. 

If you survive the journey to the bottm of the Death Pits, great treasures await you un the form of an unlockable shop and several monster drops for Members and non-members alike. 

Happy Birthday Dage!

Tomorrow is Dage The Evil's birthday and he has sent a shadow of himself to Battleon with enticing birthday rares to lure fresh souls into his Soul Forge, where there are a number of new Dage items for Legion members to earn!

His Birthday Shop contains 12 AC Rare items, including the DarkCaster Arcanist Ring, the Ascended Paragon Pet with 2 farming quests that provide items for the SoulForge and the new Ascended DarkCaster set. You can also use your gold to purchase Essence Of The Undead Legend which Dage has assured us will return on his Birthday every year (and possibly a few other special events). 

Meanwhile, Dage has finally left Shadowfall to set up his new base of power in his SoulForge, where he uses the souls of his Legion to forge new, increasingly diabolical weapons armors and more. 

Dage's birthday doesn't last forever so don't miss out. 

Happy Deathday Dage!

Stormbringer Set

For a Limited time we are offering EVERYONE who buys ANYTHING from us, the Stormbringer Set!

I mean anything. Any Membership package and any AC bundle. Buy something, relog and look in your Book of Lore in the Achievement Badges section and use the Stormbringer Badge to access the items!

No, You Can't Be A Mod. 

The No, You Can't Be A Mod shirt in Heromart is now on sale in Green and Black. It comes with a character page achievement badge, a non-member pet, a tasty muffin AND the NOT A MOD Class! 

To read the Skills Breakdown for the class, just click here! 

That's all I got. have a great weekend!

OR ELSE!

EXTRA NOTE:

You guys are submitting great pics to the Dage the Evil contest, but we've got to keep all comments on the pictures clean. (Family friendly and all, right?) If you're going to submit your pictures on Twitter, please post them there directly, not on Twitpic. Or use any free online photo gallery.

Our volunteer forum moderators thank you.

February 28, 2013

Not A Mod Class

No, You Can't Be A Mod (Shirt)

As you probably know, LOTS of people ask to be made into Mods. Most of them don't know the secret to becoming a Mod. They don't really even know what they are asking for since most of them want to be Devs instead of Mods, but it's simpler to lump us all together. 

A few years ago I got asked so much that I went to a t-shirt store in the mall and had a shirt made saying "No, you can't be a Mod" so I could wear it to DragonCon and save me answering people there. 

Now, years later, people are STILL asking so we've decided to make the shirt for HeroMart so you can spread the word. The cool thing about the shirt is that it's such an inside joke that most people will just read it and wonder what it means, but those who get it will laugh. 

The shirt, available now on HEROMART.COM, comes in your choice of Green (like the original) or Black (like the empty bits in space). It comes with the Not A Mod Shirt Achievement Badge for your character page and THREE in-game items.

1. Li'l Cysero Non-Member Pet. He dances along beside your character but will, from time to time, point and laugh at you, the player. 
   
   
2. A Tasty Muffin. It's technically a sword with a pretty wide damage range. Why is it a muffin? I felt like having a muffin when i made it (A player suggested that a muffin would go well with the coffee mug potions) 
   
   
3. The NOT A MOD Class: It's not too fancy, just like not being a Mod. 

Most of the questions I've been getting are about the class and how awesome it is. 

It isn't. If it were awesome it would be the Yes, You Can Be A Mod shirt. It's a silly class just like the other items. At least that was the idea. As it turns out, it kind of does rule. 

NOT A MOD CLASS SKILLS BREAKDOWN

It's got jeans and flip-flops, just like me (in real life). It's a very simple single target, Warrior based class and i had a LOT of fun with the skills (even the icons). The whole concept of the Not A Mod class is just being a normal gamer, instead of a hero with a great destiny or an all-powerful game Mod. 

 AUTO ATTACK

2 second cooldown

A strong attack known only to disciplined fighters.

 REASONABLE STRIKE

10 mana, 4 second cooldown

This is a completely average hit which does perfectly normal damage. 

You're not a mod. What were you expecting? Super powers? LAWLZ.

 BUTTON MASH

15 mana, 6 second cooldown

You really have no clue what you're doing. Just hit some buttons and hope something works. Does slightly higher than average damage with a higher than average chance to crit. 

I'm a gamer but i have all kinds of friends. I'm sure you have one like this. They don't play games and when they try they look like a duck trying to land a 747. They don't actually use the controller to play the game, they just randomly mash buttons in a frenzy. The thing is... somehow, this often works. Especially for non-gamer girls who play fighting games. Don't ask me why. 

This is the first single skill that has a higher chance to crit than others without consuming any kind of stack. (not counting guaranteed crit skills). 

 FREAK OUT

15 mana, 10 second cooldown

You're probably fighting a monster. Why wouldn't you panic? Doubles haste so you can flap your hands at the thing for a while. 

If you found yourself really transported into AQW, then came face to face with a real dragon... do you think you'd actually fight it? Are you mental? You'd flip out, maybe faint and almost certainly need a change of pants. 

This a cheap haste boost that you can basiclly spam. Love it. 

 FIGHT RESPONSE & FLIGHT RESPONSE

Rank 4 passives

Damage Output Increased by 10%

Haste increased by 10%

You get the benefits of both the Fight AND Flight responses at the same time. Lucky you!

 STORE BRAND PAIN KILLER

45 mana, 20 second cooldown

How do heroes handle all this fighting all the time? Take a few pills and you'll feel better. Casts a heal over time and reduces incoming damage for a little while. 

Hero's get beat up a lot and just keep going like nothing happened. Normal people need aspirin when they stub their toes. 

This is a nice HoT (Heal over time) and the damage resist buff is nice. 20 seconds may seem long until you realize how often you are using Freak Out which cuts your cooldowns. 

 DID YOUR HOMEWORK

Rank 10 passive

After some online research you now know some weak spots on the stuff you're fighting. Increase Crit by 10%

Starting to get the hang of living in Lore after all your freaking out and hand flapping, are you? Just a solid crit buff. Can't complain about that. 

The descriptions are silly but as it turns out this is a pretty decent single target class for boss farming or Group PvP. I wouldn't use it for 1V1 since it doesn't have a big alpha strike ability, 

We have NO idea how well these shirts are going to sell, but we can't afford to keep reprinting them forever so this class counts as a Rare. Check it out on HeroMart now!