TestLive Pets, combat and Dungeons update, oh my! [08/17/2018]

Hello Exiles,

Exciting new things to test for you as we deploy the pet taming system, a new dungeon and new combat mechanics to TestLive!

This patch is relatively big (17GB). We are however looking into adding a separate download for TestLive so you won’t have to switch back and forth between the Live game and our Test Servers. We can’t promise anything just yet but we are checking options that hopefully will make it easier for you to switch to TestLive to try out new content and help us with feedback and input.

With that said, we would like to ask you to provide input in the pet balancing specifically. This is work in progress and should make the pets feel rewarding and viable without them neither being too weak or too powerful. Please use these dedicated TestLive forums[forums.funcom.com] to discuss.

• New Dungeon: The Midnight Grove
• New pet taming system
• New offhand combat mechanics
• New Arrows: Light Arrows, Tar Arrows, Poison Arrows, Ivory Arrows, Explosive Arrows, Healing Arrows

• Right now animal pens look empty while the baby animal is undergoing training and once training is complete.
• Animal pens only have 250HP
• Animals in Pens do not consume food or produce ingredients
• True Name of Derketo cannot be crafted
• Panther Pet crafting time is extremely fast
• Crocodile Hatchlings are transformed into Tamed Spotted Hyena when placed in Pen
• Pet feeding screen cannot be opened from the radial menu
• Crafted Pet ends up in output inventory, but should go to pet inventory.
• Grove of Jhebbal Sag does not disappear upon creating True Name of Jhebbal Sag
• Feed Box UI is rescaled each time a new thrallified animal is placed
• Rhino pet following you will run around when you move away from it
• Players can sometimes place pets even if “Overlapping with placed object” error message is displayed
• Avatar of the Jhebbal Sag is a bit wonky
• When teleporting into the JhebbalSag dungeon bosses sometimes do not spawn

• Added Pet taming system
• Added Werewolves
• Added Nightvision Potion, allowing players to see more clearly when it’s dark
• New Dungeon: The Midnight Grove
• New offhand combat mechanics
• New Arrows: Light Arrows, Tar Arrows, Poison Arrows, Ivory Arrows, Explosive Arrows, Healing Arrows
• Thralls will now need to be fed in order to survive. Place food items into their inventory to feed them, or use the Thrall Pot to distribute food automatically

• Added new combat animations
  – The Sword/Axe/Mace and Shield heavy chain will now incorporate shield bashes
  – Throwing axes are now a part of your heavy chain combos when wielded with Swords, Axes and Maces
• Added new attack to the Spider Tarantula Boss
• Added new attack to the Crocodile Boss
• New knockback setup and animations for monsters
• New Rocknose animations
• Added new idle and threat animations

• Moved Sunder debuff to the right side of the nameplate, where it belongs
• Darkened the opacity on the background panel for container inventories
• Added button to the server list where players can report downed servers

• Thralls have now 50% increased health. That is to bring them in line with some of the greater pets and also make it more interesting to take a thrall out for exploration/hunting

• Vaults have now much lower hitpoints and will decay faster
• Glowing Standing Torch should now have the correct HP when placed down
• Added more building and climbing blockers to areas where players aren’t supposed to build/climb:
  – The City of Votaries of Skelos
  – The Exiles’ camp between the Sandswept Ruins and Drifter’s Rest
  – NPC village in Deckswab’s Retreat
• The Epic version of Conan’s Atlantean Sword is now more durable than its Mid Grade equivalent, as it should be
• Fixed swapped ingredients for Ugly and Unapetizing Fish Tropies
• Re-balanced armor bonuses to stats

• Fixed some bugs related to NPC patrols around camps
• Bossonian Bow can be repaired again
• Status effects, journey steps and crosshairs should now be temporarily removed when cinematics trigger
• Fixed an animation bug where animals would turn away from you after attacking
• Fixed a bug where the player character would clip through solid structures when re-logging after sitting in a chair
• It should now be possible attach fence foundations corner-to-corner at a right angle
• Fixed a bug where Reinforced Wooden Awnings couldn’t be placed
• All sloped wall pieces now detract the same amount of stability
• Aquilonian Braziers, Hanging Braziers and Khitan Lamps should no longer be placeable underground
• Fixed a bug where the sound of footsteps in water would play when walking on the edge of the Large Water Well
• Fixed Iron Brazier in Deathwhisper Camp so it doesn’t float anymore
• Fixed a bug where low tier items would lose all durability after having damage kits applied to them
• Fixed a bug where the Noxious Gas debuff would wear off, even when standing in gas
• Hatch Frames now snap to walls, door frames and frame pieces
• Statues of Refreshment can now be placed near any of Mitra’s religious buildings
• Giant Snakes and Alpha Snakes should now drop Reptile Hides when harvested
• You should now be able to harvest Crimson Lotus Flower with Sickles
• JungleBirds now drops heads
• Glowing Sticks should now be usable underwater
• Fixed a bug where the expiration timer on Purified Flesh would display a negative value
• Players should now be able to place walls next to stairs
• Fixed an issue where the Witch Queen could be engaged behind the magical barrier
• Fixed a bug where gamepad and mouse would lose functionality after controlling an avatar
• Ostrich egg clutches under ground in the middle of the desert are are now above-ground
• Fixed an issue where placeables would disappear if the base of the item was slightly below-ground
• Fixed a bug where you could override the corruption limit by drinking Corruption Brew
• Fixed a bug where bedroll map marker would disappear after respawn
• Helped a Shaleback out from inside a tree by moving his spawn point
• Fixed a bug where you wouldn’t do damage when jumping on another person’s head
• Fixed a bug where the Palisades’ placement brush would give the “Spikes” debuff and cause lag issues
• Fixed a bug where The Kinscourge would lose aggro if the player stands on a balustrade
• Fixed an issue with re-binding the CTRL key
• Fixed a bug where dismantling a Wheel of Pain would cause it to drop an unlootable loot bag

• Merchants now have names and are marked as “Merchant”, rather than “Fighter”
• White placeholder icon for teleportation buff is now no longer visible
• Various audio fixes
• It should now be easier to place items on the Wall Hanging Shelf
• Planters are no longer semi-indistructable when attacked with a trebuchet
• Archpriests of Yog should now use the correct weapon rather than a Yog Cleaver
• Removed the ability to apply Weapon Damage Kits to torches as it was causing bugs
• Fixed missing collision on chests placed on the roof of The Well of Skelos

• Reduced the size of the button to open the log folder, allows the log window to be larger
• Added a button to open the folder containing the ini files
• Added a button to copy the mac/hardware address to the clipboard (useful when trying to do port forwarding on a web interface)
• Added a combo selector for the server region
• Added an edit field for the maximum number of players allowed on the server
• Added a check: If settings have changed, the launcher will ask to confirm about losing changes when starting the server
• Added a startup check: If we find a running server process that happens to not be the one in our sub-folder, display a message and quit
• Changed the deployment/update/starting/stopping sequence to make it easier to know what is happening (icon changes and messages in the status bar)
• Added support for switching between the Live and TestLive branch
• The revision and snapshot information is now extracted from the Dreamworld DLL and displayed in the UI
• Removed the tray icon
• Added an option to force validate the server installation