Jerrith - Greetings and thank you for attending tonight's UOHoC.
Jerrith - Tonight's chat topic is In Testing and as such we will accept questions related to this topic.
Jerrith - Jerrith will be our moderator for this evening. In order to submit questions, please /msg or /query Zorn, Kehleyr, Prescient, or Serephina
Jerrith - Please /msg different question-takers at different times, in order to balance the load, and speed this process up. Do not msg anyone from Origin--these questions will be ignored.
Jerrith - Remember they may not have the opportunity to answer all of your questions. In addition, some questions may not be answered if they feel that it is not appropriate or that it has been better answered through some other question.
Jerrith - In addition, please do not submit any questions that have already been answered during past conferences.
Jerrith - We encourage you to read the logs of the previous UOHoCs, which are available at http://uohoc.stratics.com
Jerrith - Thanks for coming, everyone. We will now begin accepting questions.
Jerrith - As we have a number of new faces from OSI, we're going to start with some introductions. :)
Sage - I wanted to thank everyone for coming tonight when I know many of you are looking to place a house on TC.
Sage - Before we get started, I wanted to take a moment to introduce the new team. For those of you that don't know me,
Sage - my name is Paul Sage and I am the lead designer on UO Live.
Sage - Joining our team are the following new members
Sage - Tom Chilton AKA Evocare
Sage - Michael Farone AKA Ignatz
Sage - Thomas Eidson AKA Hanse
Sage - Jonathan LeCraft AKA Oaks
Sage - Daniel Buckler AKA fieryice
Sage - and the absent Pete Warner AKA Adrick
Sage - All of these folkes make up the new design team
Sage - One of the questions I get asked most is what are you all doing right now? Right now we are concentrating on game stability and fixing balance issues.
Sage - We are committed to fulfilling the features we have announced, but expect a few new things in there as well.
Sage - I have been associated with UO for over four years now, and I can tell you that I expect this year to be one of the best years ever.
Sage - This is an extremely talented team and I am already impressed by their dedication.
Sage - Now on to the questions...

Glamdring - *Necromage* Will the issues of cartography skill gain be addressed like those have been of veterinary? It is now currently impossible to Gm cartography due to the lack of a difficult action to reach past 95
fieryice - You can GM cartography by decoding level 2 (or above) treasure maps.
fieryice - If you know of any issues with cartography, please email me. ([email protected])

Glamdring - *SaffronEntivore* Some people think the chessy house test was a failure... what is are your opinions on the matter?
Sage - Chessy house test went well from our side of the fence. There were problems with giving the players the appropriate feedback, and we will be correcting this.
Sage - Players who were being logged out immediately after logging in was a designed feature. Basically, if you don't have the right deed, the game logs you off to make room for the people that do.
Sage - Many people skipped the first gump which explained this.
Sage - The problem is that there needs to be a gump telling people that they are in their two hour time out period
Sage - We will correct that.
Sage - There may have also been some other problems player side, and we are still collecting feedback. The good news is that the load balancing of the servers
Sage - looked good, and that was the main thrust of this test. Shoring up some rough edges on the new system will be a priority, but I was pleased with what I saw.
Sage - Thanks for everyone who tried and will be trying on phase three.

Glamdring - Just a reminder everyone...please do not message myself or anyone from OSI, these questions will be ignored.
Glamdring - Please pass all questions through the question takers listed in the topic
Glamdring - *Linq* Are there any plans to relook magery and what it is today?
Oaks - We are always looking out for imbalances and exploits, however we aren't currently discussing any type of complete revamp of the spell system.

Glamdring - *C_Aladen_LS* what are the rules for the player rewards and how will this be figured out in game with how constant one plays or just by how long the account has been effect?
Sage - The player rewards is still being looked at as a system. The design as it currently stands will reward those players with accounts which have been active for the specified times
Sage - I don't know if we are planning any "gap" in account open status measures at this time. We will post a more fully fleshed out system when it is closer to being ready. Good Q!

Glamdring - *Necromage* It has currently been stated that treasure chests that have been dug up on trammel will not be available to anyone else but those in the hunter's party. Could it be possible to make treasure chests in Felucca turn chest thieves "grey" to the hunter's party so that proper defense of their property is an option?
Ignatz - Sounds like an idea worth investigating, thanks. *takes full credit for the idea*
Ignatz - : )

Glamdring - *SaffronEntivore* There is always a lot of effort on reducing skills/items/systems that make someone too powerful or profitable... but why not the other way around? Why not make cooking profitable?
Sage - That is another really good question. Part of the goals of every team has been to improve skills and provide new and rewarding experiences. As any one of the new designers can tell you, my main focus will be on finding positive solutions to such problems wherever possible.
Sage - Sometimes, of course, it is necessary to take something away, but our goal is to give value to all skill sets and make every profession viable.
Sage - So I think cooking should be profitable, we just have to find a way to slay the time Demon and get all these things in.

Glamdring - *Sulfuric* If someone places a house, redeeds it, places it again.. etc on Cats Test, will that enter them in the draw multiple times or only count as 1?
Sage - Nope. We are basing the drawing on account number. No repeats allowed. ;)

Glamdring - *dethdelr* Has there been any consideration given to implementing a lottery system and only allowing a certain number of accounts to place houses at any given time?
Sage - Yes. There has been consideration of it. We have considered many different systems, and many have them are viable. The lottery system did not pan out, and we hope not to have to go to one. Our hope is that the test tonight is successful.

Glamdring - *Smello* What of quests and the like? Many have said that the game is getting more boring with less to do.. when might the faction system become a priority?
Evocare - We're absolutely commited to bringing new systems into the UO world that dramatically enhance the veteran play experience. In fact, the faction system is slated to move onto test center as soon as all the housing changes are complete! =]

Glamdring - *Cuchulainn* Can you give us any more detail as to thoughts on Guild Alliance system as listed on In-Concept?
Sage - I really can't go into much detail. Details change very often In Development and breed expectations. If we decide that Alliances are worthwhile given the rest of our changes, we will of course proceed with them
Sage - Sorry I can't give you more than that.

Jerrith - *ghyde* Doesn't concern the Dev Team that innocent players may be banned as a result of players who innocently buy items from people who have acquired their ill-gotten gains through duping, without even knowing that the vendor they bought the item off was owned by a duper?
Sage - Any banning of innocent players would be very bad and of course the Dev Team, and every team would be concerned. However, I feel confident, and I repeat confident, that the methods we are using are meticulous and thorough.
Sage - Mistakes crop up in any system, but I believe these people are working very hard for the players. We want our players to feel confident that the world in which they inhabit is free of cheating as much as possible.
Sage - Because we can't release details, I know much of this feels shady. I can only assure you that our #1 goal is to entertain people. We don't ever want to ban anyone, unless those people are infringing
Sage - upon the entertainment of the majority of our honest players.

Jerrith - *Ravilicus* Is there any remote chance that those guilds still interested in having "private" wars with other guilds will be able to participate in the faction wars, perhaps WITHOUT the benefits that are gained by "normal" factions politically over towns, etc?
Evocare - the current design disallows "private" guild warfare on the part of guilds involved in the faction system, but the issue is most definitely one we're aware of. We certainly want as wide an array of guilds as possible to take part in the system.

Jerrith - *Kadriya* The gates are not working now.. they tend to desolve just after casting is this part of the new bugs? and will it be fixed?
Oaks - We want to address as many of these issues as possible. That is one of our goals.
Oaks - *C_Dariuas_LS* Has there been any consideration on allowing 1 houser per account PER user? IE No Multipul account houses?
Sage - We are currently happy with the account restrictions on housing.

Jerrith - *dethdelr* Where do we direct problems that are encountered during the housing tests?
Calandryll - One of the best places to post information on the house test is on the uo.com boards
Calandryll - that way you can also get feedback from other players who may have experienced the same problem, as well as feedback from us.

Jerrith - And with that, we'll conclue tonight's UOHoC chat.
Jerrith - Thanks everyone for coming tonight, in particular, Calandryll, Evocare, fieryice, Hanse, Ignatz, Oaks, and Sage from OSI.