SmokeJumper: What is Age of Discovery?
Smokejumper responded to a thread from nine days ago on the EQ2 Forums asking for a clear answer to what exactly is Age of Discovery. He basically said what we already knew about the content included in Age of Discovery. Reading through it and some of his follow up posts, it looks as though the “expansion” will be coming out near the end of November but price and distribution information won’t be released until next week by the marketing folks.
There are some good questions in this thread. Let me share some of the details of how we’re rolling out content for the game currently, so you understand better what we’re doing:
1) Destiny of Velious is going to be one of the biggest expansions ever made. The content you’ve received so far is only half of the total content you will receive for that same expansion purchase. The rest of it is going to be released from now through 2013 in several installments. (There’s the whole “dragon” side of the continent left to explore!) The Withered Lands, Skyshrine, Siren’s Grotto, Cobalt Scar and a lot more is being developed currently.
2) We’ve made a commitment to you to revamp the two cities that we all hold most dear: Freeport and Qeynos. The Freeport revamp will release at the same time as Age of Discovery, but will be received by *all* players, not just expansion pack purchasers.
3) The Age of Discovery expansion pack is a collection of major features, all designed to add fun, new experiences, replayability, and user-generated content into the game. The Beastlord is the most requested feature we’ve ever had for this game and we’re delivering it. Dungeon Maker takes the world of Norrath and allows players to craft part of it and allow other players to explore it. Mercenaries are extremely useful to heroic content players or solo players (and that’s a *lot* of us). The Tradeskill Apprentice allows crafters to find new recipes and make tremendously cool items of their own. And of course, Reforging and the AA limits provide new gameplay for the min/maxers amongst us (and again, there’s a *lot* of us), as well as letting you find great new effects for your weapons.
We are working to deliver more and more content in the coming months. We’ve been revamping our art pipeline to allow us to generate terrain more quickly so that we can do more and our design tools have been being streamline allowing more rapid work on that side of the fence also.
And after the AoD release, we’re going to circle back to features that we’ve released in the last couple of years to do refinement and fixes, many of which have been requested on these boards. (Public Quests, Battlegrounds matchmaking, PvP adjustments to counteract effects of recent feature additions, etc). This work will mostly be the code team working through the issues while the designers and artists stay on task creating new zones and revising Qeynos.
AoD is full of gameplay and well worth the price of admission, and we’re continuing to create content on a very regular, constant and frequent basis. We’re really looking forward to the November launch. There’s a scad of new info coming out about the features, the Freeport revamp, and more. We hope you’ll also be excited as you see more and more of that detail appearing.
He later posted:
Mercs are definitely allowed in any group, including raids. They’re not designed to be as good as a player though, so it’s up to you whether they’re valuable on a raid.
Noticing that there were still unanswered questions, Raknid asked:
So are we to assume that it will be like the other expansions:
- Available in retail channels?
- Include previous expansions?
- Be sold as a package only and not piecemeal?
Thanks.
Smokejumper answered with this:
This kind of info is better released through the official marketing channels. Those will open up next week and you’ll get tons of info on these questions.
So it looks like next week we get to find out how much this “expansion” is going to cost.
Tags: age of discovery, mercenaries
Trackback from your site.
Comments (29)
Isest
| #
I think it will be 39.95 for digital download, 65.99 for a ce digital download. No box will be available.
That’s what I think, because it sounds like smoke jumper is really proud of what they have done, so were going to be paying full price.
Oh well I will go get my tin foil hat and go crawl back into my mancave, and wait.
he he.
Reply
bhagpuss
| #
Age of Discovery has far more content that’s of use and interest to me than any expansion since Kunark. By the time Velious launched I was so fed up of buying expansions for the ten or fifteen percent of content I could actually use that I just didn’t bother buying it at all.
I expect to use pretty much 100% of Age of Discovery, so if it costs the same price as Velious that will be a huge bargain for me.
Reply
Gaige
| #
Casual scrubs like you are ruining the game. Please stay in EQ2 when TOR comes out, thanks in advance Scrubpuss <3
Reply
Liftik
| #
“…as well as letting you find great new effects for your *WEAPONS*”…
Question: I hope SJ just misspoke, but will the Item Reforging in AoD allow us to customize *ALL* gear (armor, charms, shields ect…) with “great new effects”, or just weapons?
Reply
Kaufman
| #
“AoD is full of gameplay and well worth the price of admission, and we’re continuing to create content on a very regular…”
What this really means is that they are giving you new features to interact and interface with existing content, but this expansion will have no new content.
Call me a purist, but it ain’t an expansion unless I get to zone into someplace new like an overland zone, and explore a new part of the world. It is that simple. Sure, I can roll a BL and then go do all the same tired stuff. Sure I could hire mercs and go do all the same tired stuff. Sure I would reforge the same badly optimized items. Sure, I could have a proxy toon run some McDungeon for some new micro-currency. None of this “expansion” has me excited.
Reply
C. Scrub
| #
Casual scrubs make up the vast majority of MMO players and thus pay the salaries of the people who make the game you believe you rule over, Gaige.
Wake up and notice that the king isn’t wearing any clothes.
Reply
Dethdlr
| #
Gaige wrote:
Aren’t you supposed to be playing Rift right now anyway? 🙂
Gaige wrote:
And yet…. you’re still here. 🙂 So what do you think, six months after TOR launches and you’ll be back? 🙂
Reply
Zerigo
| #
This is going to be the biggest waste of 40 bucks ever. And it will be required for raiding / grouping, cause lets face it, no one wants to play with scrubs.
Reply
Freykin
| #
Bhagpuss, I’m in the same boat. As someone who isn’t at the end game, content, everything in this next expansion is stuff I can use, which has me excited about it. Mercenaries sound fantastic for soloing/duoing through the earlier content, and new classes are always interesting to me.
Reply
Trueflight
| #
While I agree with some of the others that this has a lot of useful features for those not up to end game content or casual players, I still feel that it would have been better suited as a free GU or even DLC like back in the days of Splitpaw and Bloodline Chronicles. This all feels like content taht should have been added with the normal free update cycles, or maybe held off until next February with the normal Expansion release cycle and become part of a bigger, better expansion.
Some interesting new features, just would have liked to see “more”. If I wasn’t getting AoD for free from attending fan faire, I doubt I would be bothering to pick it up myself (depending on the price). Seems like a rushed attempt to get a second “expansion” out in a single year to make a few extra bucks. I’m curious to see how this all turns out in the end.
Reply
Dethdlr
| #
Smokejumper also posted an explanation of how they planned on doing expansions for a while as well. I didn’t post it in this article because we’ve reported it here before.
CeJae wrote:
And Smokejumper responded with:
For me, it’s just another way of doing things. They could have given us everything in AoD for free and charged us for the additional Velious content and people would be complaining about the additional Velious content not being as good as the Kunark expansion or not enough zones, not enough quests, etc. Instead, they’re trying something new and giving us the additional Velious content for free and charging us for the AoD stuff.
For me, either way, I’d be buying a new expansion and getting all this new stuff. With their new method, it makes AoD optional for those not wanting/needing the additional stuff (raiders, for example, may require the additional AAs). Doesn’t really matter to me which part they say they’re charging for and which part they’re giving away. But that’s just me.
Reply
Green Armadillo
| #
Quoth Dethdlr: “For me, either way, I’d be buying a new expansion and getting all this new stuff. With their new method, it makes AoD optional for those not wanting/needing the additional stuff (raiders, for example, may require the additional AAs).”
I don’t even raid, but this is the part of the package that really rubs me the wrong way.
– I don’t care about Beastlords because I’m not going to re-roll.
– I don’t care about mercs, though it would not surprise me if all future solo content is mysteriously replaced with duo content to require the feature (much as all solo quest rewards are now legendary quality to require EQ2X players to pay the per-item unlock fee).
– I don’t care about reforging, which really only matters to the extent that their itemization bot can’t itemize properly anyway.
– I don’t care about the DYOD until they let me use my real character, and the idea of paywalling it off from non-purchasers (if that’s what is happening, I still don’t understand whether this is in or out) will only hurt its uptake.
So basically, I get to buy a second expansion in a year for an undisclosed amount of money, which will give me an AA cap increase that will consist of 49 points of passive DPS increase and one mandatory ability that content will be balanced around. Forgive my lack of enthusiasm.
Yes, they could have repackaged the new content as part of AOD, which would have left no content for the content patches. Other MMO’s that charge $15/month manage to provide content in their patches and still have content for their expansions. (This may be easier for other MMO’s because no MMO I’m aware of other than EQ1 and EQ2 hits players up for $40 in expansion fees on top of $15/month in subs every 12 months regardless oh how little content is available for that money.)
My solution to this is very simple. I will wait until the price of AOD comes down to a level I consider acceptable, and I will leave my subscription inactive until that time, to ensure that I am eligible for the inevitable winback promotion – if only I had canceled my account more in 2011, I would have 2000 Station cash (and a vulture mount) to defray the costs of AOD.
Reply
Ryan
| #
@Gaige I can promise I will stay far away from that train wreck but will YOU promise to finally stay out of EQ2 forever unlike the last, oh, 5? times you have quit? BTW its people like you that have ruined mmos in general and I feel very sorry for the TOR community.
Reply
skipppydippy
| #
Sadly given sheer lack of content this will be the first expansion i pass on,if as we all suspect its the full price,of course if its pitched at say £15 maybe i’ll relent but not at the full price i can wait for these “features”.
This is a sad year for EQ2 this dev team seems unable to provide decent bug free content for its players,of course the cash cow of station cash is sated each week but to hell with the many bugs that litter the game,its a shame really Smokejumper has been bad for the game in my view clearly they just dont have the man power to deliver whats needed for the game and given EQ2 is supposed to be an SOE flagship title its a bit odd.
If players feel this adventure pack is worthwhile then hey good on you,its your cash but,and i’ve thought this for ahwile really,to me its nothing more than a cash grab before TOR hits and hits hard EQ2 player base (and for that matter more or less EVERY mmo).
The nonsense about DOV part 2 is ticking my nips too,its nothing more than spin trying a line that theres great stuff to come honestly is a bit like saying hold this brick while i build a house as i may need it,what no doubt will come along is a dribble of content maybe 3 LU’s a year if we’re lucky,the fanchaps will lap it up as proof of how well the dev team are doing,most though will see it as buggy content pushed through without much testing of it.
I’m not sure where the games heading at the moment and frankly i dont think Smokejumper does either,he seems unable to focus on where or what(if he has one) his vision is for the game,aside of SC of course.
Reply
miragian
| #
If I understood all that correctly at least we aren’t having to pay for the other half of the Velious stuff. I’m kind of hoping that they borrow from last year and give fan fair attendees the option to upgrade to whatever inevitable CE there is.
Reply
Anaogi
| #
Good luck with that, Gaige.
As for what AoD is, it’s a way to get more of our money in a hard economy for looking like you’re adding something to the game. Sticking the AA cap in with a lot of features most players can take or leave is a ridiculously cynical ploy to guarantee that most of the player base will buy what should otherwise be a strictly optional product.
Fire Smokejumper in ’12. Thatisall.
Reply
Harvy of Unrest
| #
Honestly I’m not sure if I’ll really use the highlight features of the new expac…. but of course I “have” to buy it if I want my AA raise. That is what rubs me wrong.
Toss the AA raise out of the mix and make it available via GU would make me happier.
Reply
Feldon
| #
It wouldn’t make the accountants happy though…
Reply
Isest
| #
Do we know if were getting the aa cap rais or just mre ways to spend what we got. I remember when they were talking at that aa stuff about tradescills and it came out of your current aa stuff. I would like to knnow more about thiss aa stuff, other then they are doing something.
Reply
Daffodil
| #
“We’ve made a commitment to you to revamp the two cities that we all hold most dear: Freeport and Qeynos.”
So because they know we like them, they’re going to nuke them.
Reply
Urgthock
| #
If it weren’t for the Beastlords and AA cap raise, I too would not be buying this expansion. As it is, if it is a “full price expansion” (i.e. $40) I will more than likely wait until the new year to purchase it as I have much better things to spend my very valuable holiday dollars on. With the minimal features being offered, the purchase would simply not be valuable enough to me to warrant taking priority over other things at that price.
Reply
Landacet Spacegoat From Guk
| #
“It wouldn’t make the accountants happy though…”
I think the hardest part for everyone is trying to leave after having played for such a long time due to the lack of effort in what we currently have, as a business SJ is a money making dev who is willing to bleed us as much as he can( that is probably the primary set of goals in his annual review).
What would make the biggest change would be if they fix most of the bugs they currently have in game(at least we wouldnt pick on their mistakes that often)
We are all speculating on the price but SJ hinted a lot on his post, which would lead me to believe this expansion will not be 20$. As I said before i wouldnt mind paying 40$ for a well thought, well tested , and great release. Unfortunaly that is not whats expected from our previous experiences.
After SJ and SOE get our money can we at least have some inprovements on server caused lag, particularly in zones like drunder where theres a lot more rendering our machines have to do, and will you finally after 5 years take a closer look at fight scripts, because memwipes, dots, curses, adds dont make a fight challenging just longer.
Reply
stwsr
| #
I really wish there was some way we could all boycott AoD to send SOE the message in the manner in which they will only hear – directly affecting their income stream.
That and firing Smokejumper! xD
Reply
Green Rhonin
| #
I can’t believe someone would call someone a casual scrub, then talk about SWTOR, which is so World of Warcraft that it’s sickening.
lol
Reply
matthewayne
| #
Yahh. I agree with the previous comments. This is the first so-called “expansion” I’m going to pass on. Seems like AoD is just another way for them to get money out of us. These “features” should’ve been free and released as updates. Seriously?! who will care about the other-half of DoV in 2013?? Sorry SoE.. gonna be too late by then for me. With all the great games releasing soon and all the idiotic bugs/let-downs coming from the dev team over the past year.. I’m not even sure i’ll continue to play EQ2. Fail. Fail. Fail. You killed EQ2 for me. Thanks!
Reply
Lisa McCall
| #
I am always grateful for new content on any game I play. Stop flaming EQ2 or you all may find yourself gameless.Calling ppl scrubs is insulting and I hope you aren’t taking on the hateful attitudes of Wow players, that’s so sad, that’s why I like EQ2, the friendly people who are playing for fun not some competion race, and a thinly veiled excuse to put down others.People are getting too mean in general…
Reply
Landacet From Guk
| #
Flamming each other wont do much, but Lisa what their intentions are clear to let eq2 understand that they do a very bad job with their releases and maintenance period.
Reply
Landacet From Guk
| #
scratch the what lol
Reply
Ketta
| #
I’ve been putting in my own comments on the featured thread in this blog (I’d started one of my own before, but it didn’t generate the same momentum as this one did). While I share some of the beliefs and misgivings that many have voiced, the main concern I have is this: why haven’t they confirmed whether or not old content will be included?
I originally asked this because I came back to EQ2 and wanted to get DoV, but decided to just wait for AoD to come out. However, I couldn’t confirm that old content would be included, even after hours of searching and then days of waiting for answers on forums, etc. It REALLY bothers me that they won’t confirm this; it reminds me of an old penny-wise and dollar-stupid boss I had, who didn’t allow employees to share what upcoming sales would feature, so customers would spend their money NOW and not wait.
Spit it out, SOE. Seriously. Either let me know I need to buy DoV now and I will, or let me save a few bucks and get it with AoD. Either way, I, like many others, am buying AoD. By the way, happy customers spend money. I’ll most likely spend the money I save on station cash anyway. RAWR!
Reply