[New Uniques and Legendaries - Brainstorming]

Any chance for unique scythes? I wish flail was an option, but it can't be implemented from what I've read.

I currently have one more scythe on my list of the planned items - I thought of naming it "Soul Reaper", so it looks like my thoughts flow in the same direction that Yoshio suggested. However, I already have quite a few items in process and the updates became rare partially because I spread myself too thin between all the things I started. I want to wrap up some of the projects that are closer to completion before working on a new scythe model.

 

That is exactly the trouble with scythes - there were only three models for them in game and their designs didn't leave a lot of room for customization via textures. It just does not sound like a good idea to use the same appearance for a lot of unique items, so making new scythes requires bringing in new models. I haven't found any interesting existing models that can be adapted for Sacred (there are scythe models available, of course, but they are either plain or expensive), and creating a new model takes time, so making a scythe is not a top-priority project, but I keep it in mind.

[Progress in co-op campaign]

In multiplayer, the best way to determine whether or not your progress is being saved is to watch out for save messages that appear when you come into a new zone, complete a quest, or use the monolith. If both of you see the "Game saved" message, then all progress in campaign and side quests is being saved for both characters, but if "Character saved. Campaign status not saved" message appears, then you've probably chosen a wrong game mode. To be saved correctly, both characters need to be created for multiplayer games. If a singleplayer character enters MP, the progress won't be saved. Also, "Free Play" mod never saves quest progress.

[Tried making relics as socket items?]

The lists of items that can be forged into a particular sockets are hard-coded and bound to the classification of the items. They can't possibly be changed by mods.

 

Sockets can contain only items that have the main "family" classifier set as "FAMILY_FORGE" in the scripts. Then the "subfamilies" indicate particular types of forge-able items and therefore which sockets they go into. Relics are technically armor, as they have the "family" set as "FAMILY_ARMOR", so they can't be possibly accepted by the sockets. The only way to enable the game to forge the relics is to re-classify them as either runes, rings or amulets, but if you do this, you won't be able to equip them into the relic holder anymore.

 

Long story short, relics can be either usable, or socketable, but not both at the same time.

[New Uniques and Legendaries - Brainstorming]

...either Templar or 16th Century Italian armor for the SW...

Really, I think what would be much more awesome is to have a Templar-style armor set adapted for a female body, and give it to the Seraphim.

The classical Templar armor makes for a quite simple (by Sacred's fantasy standard) chainmail, cloth to cover the chest and a trademark bucket-shaped helmet. I don't think it would look cool in Ancaria, because it really does not match the rest of the designs in this game. Of course, there are more creative approaches to the theme, for example, Guild Wars and Dragon Age games have rather awesome designs labeled as "Templar Armor". But when you try to analyze them, those designs look not so much "Knight Templar" as "Fantasy Paladin", which is good too, but does not exactly fit the request.

As for who of SW and Seraphim is the best candidate for getting new heavy armor, it depends on a particular design - the "Death Knight" kind of designs fit SW, while "Holy Knight/Paladin" designs are more for the Seraphim.

 

Uber suoer mod, really perfect work, now I test it and it´s great. I have one question can be Phantasm swor one handed sword, not only two handed? Because that sword look amazing, and it would be wonderful to hold one in each hand

Thanks for the praise. It's possible to make the one-handed version of this sword, but of course it won't have the same stats, for the purpose of keeping the balance. The actual Phantasm was made rather powerful on purpose, to make the idea of wielding a two-hander a bit more compelling. Those stats were meant to compensate for the fact that you can't equip the second weapon together with it. If this sword would become a one-hander, it would also be weakened - but if it's just the look you're after, a one-handed version can be made.

 

The linebreak is not registered by Notepad. Try WordPad

Both Notepad and Wordpad have their troubles with handling big TXT files, so I recommend using Notepad++ for editing the script files.

[Unlocking NPC and Unused Items for the Player]

I found one more item that remains NPC only for no obvious reason: this shortsword's model is kept in the same folder as the swords used by the playable characters, but it is only used by the Brigand Leaders.

I'm not yet sure how to use this sword, but at least it can be added to the pool of random rare items to increase the variety of weapon drops. For those who want to try it in game before the mod release: it's itemtype 2449.

[Conan the Barbarian Easter egg]

I looked at the Swords section of the wiki a bit closer, and you know, guys, we won't even have to bring the Athlantean sword model from the outside to add this sword as a new unique. Those Easter Egg fans from Ascaron not only made the room which is quite similar to the one from Conan movie - they actually made an Atlantean sword drop as one of the random one-handed swords!

 

Honestly, look at this:

And compare with this (the middle picture is the concept art of the Athlantean sword drawn for the original movie):

A closer look at the texture of this random Sacred 2 sword shows that it has the hilt design and the blade engraving of the exactly same shapes as the Athlantean sword from the Conan movie, but the lighting in game and the low resolution of the texture tends to hide the detail when the sword is wielded by Sacred characters. Here is how the extracted Sacred 2 texture looks:

 

 

On the most Conan-related pictures the Athlantean sword is pictured in darker colors than on the concept art and has more explicit engraving, but that much of design change can be easily applied to the Sacred 2 model using textures. Also, the model in Sacred 2 looks smaller than the sword in the film, so I think about enlarging it to two-hander size.

 

All in all, I'm not promising to make this sword ASAP, but as it appears to be easy to make, I'll probably look into it later. As for the quests - the number of unused quest IDs that are guaranteed to work is indeed small. In my testing I found a way to make custom quest IDs that work at least for silent quests (the ones without dialogue and logs), but I'm not yet 200% sure that this method is completely safe to use. So I won't say a definite "yes" or "no" about the possibility of adding new quests at the moment. Adding a new step for the existing quest is in fact similar to adding a new quest, because script-wise every step is considered a separate quest.

[Drop swords.]

The possibility of weapon drops depends on the weapon specific skills the character has, for example a character with the "Sword Lore" skill is supposed to get more swords than a character without this skill. Though I'm not sure if this feature works correctly in I&B - I remember getting polearms and two-handed swords with dual wielding characters more often than with polearm specialists.

 

I double checked the scripts - the swords are included into the same number of droplists as clubs and axes, so by rights they should be just as common. That is, unless there is some trouble with calling on those droplists, but even if it's so, such troubles with the game behavior are usually hardcoded and can't be fixed by mods or CM Patch.

 

As for getting unique swords - they should be more rare now, because the game tends to drop non-set uniques less frequently than set items, and sets usually only include armor.

[Conan the Barbarian Easter egg]

That's not a bad idea for a mod, actually. Conan is so popular that finding a freely available 3d model of his sword is not hard. So making the sword itself is definitely possible. Making it drop in only one place would require making a quest, which is possible too, though this part of the idea requires some testing with quest scripts.

 

By the way, how came that the Easter Egg itself is not on the wiki? If you compare the in-game room with the video fragment that shows the dead king on his throne, the likeness starts to appear quite striking. So I tend to agree that the room is a recreation of the Athlantean King's Tomb using Sacred 2 props.

[Connection Error (10) message appearing. =/ Any clues?]

Running Sacred 2 in singleplayer is technically similar to trying to join a multiplayer server. The only difference is that both client process (you can see it under the name of "sacred2.exe" in the Task Manager) and server process ("s2gs.exe") are running on the same machine. If an antivirus program blocks s2gs, and it crashes, you can get the same "connection error" and "server has disconnected" messages that you commonly expect to see in multiplayer. Try to check if your antivirus or firewall has this executable file on its block list and unblock it. If adding special permissions for Sacred 2 server is impossible or won't help, maybe you'd have to temporary turn off the antivirus while playing Sacred 2 - as it can be played without Internet connection the computer won't be seriously endangered (just don't forget to turn on the antivirus when going online).

[New Uniques and Legendaries - Brainstorming]

The SW already has Ranged Weapons as secondary skill...

I was going to tell that we can try to add Magic Staffs for him so that he could use a staff to shoot projectiles, but managed to write the wrong thing at the last moment. Anyway, the point is that we can add a skill to the skill tree of the character who can normally use the weapon or CAs the skill is for, but we can't enable a character class to do something that was not intended by the original character design.

 

Today's update to the thread presents a number of new weapons that are united by a single feature - they all burn, showcasing a variety of fire effects and dealing serious fire damage. The models were generously contributed by Pesmontis, who also provided those new items with unusual visual effects.

 

A Random Torch

The first item on the list is a simple wooden torch, which was made into a semi-random rare club. You could previously see these useful lighting devices planted on the walls of the dungeons or carried around by the Night Watchmen, and finally your characters can get them too, both from monsters and from merchants. While not being extremely powerful, the torch is useful for fighting enemies who are weak to fire damage as well as for boosting fire spells... oh, and for fighting your way on a dark road, too. While the wooden base of this torch is nothing to write home about, the fire that scatter the burning particles and ashes about is interesting to watch.

Here is the example of how the stats can roll - the fire damage bonuses and a socket are mandatory, but the weapon class specific bonus is random.

 

 

Torch of Light

The second item is an "upgraded" torch, which appeared when I suggested to use a metallic torch model instead of a stick. The base of this torch is a take on the Torchlight 2 weapon design, hence the name. And just as the name implies, this item is useful for lighting up the dark places and allows to see better at night.

 

 

Carnach's Scorching Stake

The third instalment in the fire weapon collection is a polearm (not a magic staff!) that is a small copy of a larger-than-life stake that was used by the Fire Demon Carnach. While smaller than the original, Carnach's Scorching Stake, is in no way inferior to it. So, if you want to see your enemies burning at the stake, this would be your weapon of choice.

[CM items mod]

No, the standard v140hf download does not include CM Items Mod. The Item Mod was released noticeably later than CM v140. The integration of the Item Mod into CM began as soon as the mod was released, and now there are beta versions of CM that include the Item Mod. The latest is v0147 Beta 7, which can be found here: http://www.frankrentmeister.info/mantisbt/view.php?id=1076. But keep in mind that this version of CM is still a beta and is not yet completely polished. The first complete CM to include the CM Items Mod would be v150, which probably would also be the last CM Patch version.

 

For now, the best bet is to download CM v140hf and CM Items Mod separately and install them both, unless you want to help testing the CM Patch beta version.

[New Uniques and Legendaries - Brainstorming]

>"...I am getting Pm's concerning requests for new armor and weapons... Anyway, being that these PM's are coming from new members who I think haven't read some of the older conversations, I'm going to try to help out a little..."

Thank you very much for coping with those PMs and bothering to tell us about them. It's hard to estimate how much attention the mod actually gets when only a few regular visitors post in this thread. I'm not sure why the newcomers decided to PM you about their ideas, but it's good that you did not just ignore them and told us that people are still interested in seeing new mods.

 

Now, it's true that the modding team is not as active now as it was around the version 1 release, and that there are a lot of things that were started but not yet finished. But I don't think we should put a big "CLOSED" sign on the request thread - we can always hear out the suggestions and maybe consider them for implementation later. You never know which ideas would turn out to be really good - there were certain posts on this forum that sparked our interest, and now there are a few ongoing projects that were originally suggested by common members who read our threads. Though even when the ideas are considered for implementation, there is no way to get the result immediately, as some things take time and can get delayed or even dropped.

 

As for the ideas that were sent by those PMs and listed here, well, most of them don't look like they have much chance to get implemented, but who knows. If there is one thing I can say about the scope of our modding abilities - we don't take projects that require 3D modelling from scratch, without having any existing 3D model to use as a base. It's not impossible, but requires way too much time to be considered seriously. So I don't think that any of the stuff inspired by new movies and comics is going to happen. As for the more classical designs, as that of the Cylons or Robocop that was mentioned earlier - these series were popular enough so that some fan-made art for them can be found, but converting these items to be usable in Sacred would require some very serious dedication. Personally, I'm not a big fan of either franchise, so I won't take up such project.

 

Rifles in general and sniper rifles in particular are out of question - the holding poses and animations of the weapon types currently in game just don't match the rifles. I spent quite some time looking at the bow, pistol and energy weapon animations when we considered the possibility of implementing crossbows, and I can say that they all look just way too off. That generally goes for any kind of the weapon that is drastically different from the ones present in game. We can't make new weapon skills and new weapon animations, so every weapon we bring in has to be assigned one of the previously existing skills, and then it either fits, or does not fit.

 

About the same goes for the Shield Lore skill for the Inquisitor (and Temple Guardian, for that mater) - those guys were designed as classes that are unable to use shields, so even if we force them to equip one, they would most probably fail to do it correctly. TG simply does not have a place on his model where a shield can be attached. I haven't checked the Inquisitor, but probably he does not have an attachment point for the shield either (or the shield is bound to show serious clipping with his flowing robes.) We also can't make the Dryad use pistols, as she does not have the necessary animations for such weapons, and so on.

 

BUT: we actually can try to add the Ranged Weapons skill for the Shadow Warrior. The CM Patch added Ancient Magic for TG (Issue 504 on Mantis), and by czevak's comments it sounds like adding a skill can be accomplished by a quite simple edit of creatures.txt, so it can be attempted.

[LazyTomcat's Designs as new Armor Sets]

Да, бонусы к урону на поножах. А почему бы нет? В игре можно купить желтые поножи с бонусами ко всем боевым навыкам, критическим ударам, значанию атаки и т.п. Во многих новых комплектах на поножи добавляют offensive модификаторы, например "Боевые навыки" на Броне Баатора, огненный урон и атака в комплекте Дракомага Chaoskampf, огненный урон в комплекте Софии для Серафимки. В то же время, большинство комплектных поножей в оригинальной игре повторяют одни и те же бонусы - почти половина дают скорость бега, шанс уклонения и блок привязки. У Эльфийки и так уже куча комплектов, так что если добавлять еще один, то надо делать что-то новое, а не повторять имеющиеся уники.

Моды вообще, и в особенности, моды выходящие сильно после игры, рассчитаны в первую очередь на людей, кто уже прошел игру в ее классическом варианте, и хочет попробовать что-то новое. Большинство нынешних игроков в Sacred - уже не новички, они перепобовали многие из предметов и тактик, изначально бывших в игре. Нет большого смысла давать им еще раз что-то, что они уже много раз видели. Главный смысл введения новых предметов - увеличить разнообразие и дать игрокам выбор, а там уж пусть они сами решают, хочется им надеть на персонажа классический защитный предмет, или защиты уже и так хватает, и можно поднимать урон.

-----------

Offensive modifiers on legs might look a bit unusual, but that's exactly the point. You can see some offensive modifiers on rare (yellow) legplates and on the legs from new sets like Armaments of the Nine Hells, Chaoskampf and Impressions of Sophia, so adding rather common damage modifiers to the legs is unusual, but not out of the line. At the same time most of the original sets repeat the same modifiers for this part over and over again - most set legplates add to the Run Speed, Chance to Evade and Block chance: Root. As the High Elf has a lot of sets already, there is little sense in adding items similar to the ones she already has once again.

 

Game mods in general, and especially new mods for rather old games, are aimed at the players who already spent some time with the original version of the game and want to try something different. With the newly added items, we try to add to the variety of equipment and possible strategies of its use, so that the players had more choice and could decide if they want to equip a traditional defensive item or to boost their characters' offensive capabilities.

[So, this will not actually be Sacred right?]

On a more positive outlook, perhaps Sacred 3 is tidy and complete, not needing the few weeks more, because there really wasn't that much to tidy and complete.

Considering what kind of game Sacred 3 is going to be, it's possible. Sacred 1 and Sacred 2 required a lot of time and patches to become complete and stable because of how vast they were. Big worlds, lots of quests, lots of skills, lots of weapons, unexpected ways to use combat arts that sometimes lead to unexpected results, etc. All of that could show glitches, and to increase the number of possible bugs, there were leftovers from unimplemented features getting in the way every now and then. Considering that Sacred 3 videos show corridor-like maps and its characters can use only fixed kinds of weapons, this game's design is much more predictable and easier to test and troubleshoot.

 

On the other hand, it's quite possible that the development of Sacred 3 is already finished, and Deep Silver set the release date further away in hopes to cash in on pre-orders. But as far as I can see, they fail to rise big enough hype and get a lot of people interested in early purchase: most of the comments that show under the trailer videos on YouTube and on various Sacred fan-sites contain nothing but rage and disappointment. The most polite of the comments are akin to the ones we read here on DarkMatters: they are in the vein of "we know too little to judge the game and we won't purchase it until we see the reviews". So maybe Deep Silver decided to push the release forward just because there is little point in postponing it, as most people are way too suspicious to pre-purchase anyway.

[LazyTomcat's Designs as new Armor Sets]

The last of the sets to be revealed in this thread is the High Elf set based on LazyTomcat's "Golden Raven" design. The Elf has quite a few set items already, and it was not easy to find a niche that hasn't yet been filled by another set. This new set was named "Mage of the Spectrum", and as the name implies, it's meant to boost the Elf's main role as the Sacred's Archmage. Being generally beneficial, the set was also made more rare - players would have a fair chance of getting the set items from bosses, but little chance of seeing them among mob drops and quest rewards.

Mage of the Spectrum

This set focuses on general spellcasting and non-physical damage types, providing substantial boost to spell damage and defence against spells, but offering little to nothing in terms of close and ranged combat. As you would see from the stats, the physical component was purposefully removed from all damage and armor bonuses given by this set. Another feature that you would notice is increased armor resistance values on many items - but don't be fooled by these numbers, as the full Spectrum set has about as much resistance as the Robe of Innocence alone. For this set the armor value that is usually focused on the chestplate was divided between five items - the chest holding the biggest value, helmet and belt receiving smaller bonuses and only a bit of additional armor on arms and legs. Finally, this set is meant to compensate for the fact that the Elf has no Lifeleech sets, while Magic Coup builds can use one. It might be unexpected to see the warrior's bonus put on the purely magical set, but it partially makes up for the fact of how OP the lifeleech bonus is. Aspect-wise, this set boosts supportive spells of Delphic Arcania aspect, but should be more useful for hybrid builds than purely Arcane characters.

Chest: Light of Day
In the old times people awaited the daylight as a salvation from the nighttime fears. It was during the day when they felt safe and confident and went around on their business. Nowadays people are not so afraid of the dark, but most of events still happen during daytime. While many of the daily chores are rather mundane, they make for a great portion of every life. Same with this chestplate - while it does not affect the mage's spells, it is an essential part of the set, as it is the main source of defence (though even this piece does not offer much protection against physical damage).


Arms: Glory of the Dawn
"Rise and shine, little Elf, rise and shine"
Early morning is the time when the world awakens and every little thing looks fresh and rejuvenated. While waking up with the first rays of the sun may be harder than it sounds, many cultures have traditions and figures of speech that promise good luck to early risers. So the Elves who have enough self-discipline to greet the dawn would be filled with fresh energy for the rest of the day.


Gloves: Height of Noon
"Shadows disappear at high noon"
Ancient religions connected the sun with the powerful gods and people believed that its light dispels harmful influences just as it chases away the darkness. Not surprising that in many legends the evil spirits and creatures are afraid of sunlight. At high noon the sun stays directly overhead, sending down its most intense rays and shortening the shadows so much they seem to disappear entirely. At the same time, for more grounded people, noon (or times close to it) is a time for a lunch break.


Belt: Mystery of the Night
"Fear not this night, you will not go astray" - from the

Throughout the centuries people were mystified by the nighttime, filling its darkness with figments of their imagination. Night is a time of mystery and secrets, a time that belongs not to people, but to mythical beings and supernatural powers. It is the time associated with witches and their magic. This item straightens the Elf's Arcane powers and intensifies her spells.


Legs: Colors of Sunset
People made and still continue to make many pictures trying to capture the beauty of the day's end, that burst of colors which lights up the sky before the darkness falls. But at the same time, the sunset has always been associated with the end of safety brought by the daylight, and some old myths describe this time as "death" of the sun. The item has one of the most colorful tooltips in game, and serves to remind everybody that nobody is safe if they dare to anger a mage.


Boots: Silence of Midnight
Midnight. A time of the night when all the nature stays still, as if pausing for a moment. Some creatures sleep, while others try to move as silently as they can, so as not to disrupt the general silence and stillness. At the same time, being the culmination of the dark half of day, midnight is associated with the most ancient mysteries and powerful magics.


Helmet: The Darkest Hour
"It's always darkest before the dawn"
The time of trouble can happen in every life. Problems and dangers always come uninvited, regardless of the time of day. But wise people say that the darkest hour is the one before the dawn - the events can take turn for the better and the right actions in the time of emergency can save the day. This helmet activates the Elf's hidden reserves, quickens her reaction and helps her to live through the hard times.


Ring: Fleeting Moment
Every life is a sequence of moments. Few of them are memorable, and even those that are special are fleeting. Just in a heartbeat a thing that was right before your eyes can become nothing more than a memory. But even those moments that do not seem special are still parts of our lives, often leading to the bigger, more important events. This small ring keeps the essence of its namesake - while it might not be very special in itself, it is a valuable part of the whole set, and helps to unlock powerful set bonuses. Its own bonuses help the Elf to become as elusive as the passing time and to do wonders with her personal clocks.


The Set Bonus:

Bonuses are unlocked for wearing 3, 4, 6, 7 and 8 items. Lifeleech % is the full completion bonus.

Both item modifiers and completion bonuses are quite good, but it is balanced by the fact that the set would be harder to compete than most of the other HE's full sets - the pieces start dropping from level 45, won't appear at low difficulty level and have some droplist restrictions as noted above, plus the sheer quantity of the Elf's sets makes every particular one harder to gather.

[Unbended - New project by former Ascaron employees!]

The best thing about the map is the news article about it, which states that it's just the first fragment of the world. Considering the not-framed edges of the map, it's going to be the top-right corner, so the actual map planned for the world should be at least four times bigger. That gives some hope of seeing a game with the world similar in size to at least Sacred 1.

 

And this map shows quite a few familiar names, so people from the old Sacred fanbase try to support the new project. I hope that the devs would really deliver what they aim for and release the Unbended game.

[So, this will not actually be Sacred right?]

So we have one more of so called Sacred 3 "gameplay" trailers that show little to no actual gameplay and fill the time with theatrical effects. When would they finally show at least a bit of how the game actually plays, how dynamic it is, and how the characters behave outside of the special move animations? The animations are speedy, but how intense is the actual gameplay? The only thing I learned from the trailer is that there are going to be some special weapons in Sacred 3, and looks like they come together with boss-fights against the spirits of these weapons. Quite probably that some special effects we see in these trailers are actually coming together with these special weapons and aren't the characters' actual CAs.

[Sacred 2 Balance.txt]

Is it possible to host lan multiplayer game with custom balance.txt for everyone who plays on it?

Balance.txt is a "server" script (you can tell it by the fact that it resides in a "scripts/server" folder). This means that every launched game uses the balance.txt settings of the person who started the game. In singleplayer, every player is his own server and client, so the difference between "server", "client" and "shared" scripts does not come into play. But in multiplayer there is some difference: "server" scripts are loaded at the moment when the game starts from the machine that is used as a host, "client" scripts are loaded locally, so every player who joined the game plays with the version from his own machine, and "shared" scripts should be the same for every player who joins.

 

So it is possible to start a server with modded balance, if you are going to be the host. Still, it's safer and more predictable if every participating player has the same modification in his/her game.

[Community Patch language issues]

In fact, the Community Patch does support Russian, and all its contents are fully translated into Russian language. A lot of Russian players have been using it for several years already and it usually installed without problems. Switching the system to English version was not necessary at all, as the Community Patch installer launches on the Russian system and has Russian interface.

 

As for the fact that your friend had trouble with installing CM patch: To detect Sacred game installed on the computer, CM Patch installer needs a valid registry entry to be present for the game. Up until recent it was also requiring a valid SecuROM entry to be present. From my experience with troubleshooting CM Patch issues on the Russian forums, in most cases when the installer failed to find the game it turned out that the player who experienced such trouble did not own a legal copy of the game or applied any cracks to it.

 

If your friend does own a clean official copy of the game, tell him that before launching CM Patch installer he has to manually patch his game to version 2.65.2 using official patches. If he has Russian Sacred 2 Gold, tell him that he must run the official patches despite what the disc cover and starting screen say about the version. It's a known issue: While the cover and the loading screen state that Russian Sacred 2 Gold is 2.65.2, all its scripts and files are actually patched only to 2.64, so applying official patches is necessary before installing CM. Also, CM Patch installer uses the files in the game's "scripts" folder to determine the installed version of the game, so if your friend has any mods installed that change the scripts (especially quest.txt), he has to temporary remove these mods before installing CM.

[Definition of DoT For Wiki Purposes]

I don't think that Blazing Tempest and Gust of Wind should be removed either, I was merely pointing out that consisting of separate parts does not really prevent the CA from behaving like Area of Effect. I'd rather add Glacial Thorns to the Area of Effect page, as it spreads in a sector, that ever consider BT for removal, and I think that GOW should be returned to the page. It looks like Mibbs finally got the same opinion, so the result should be fine.

 

I can see what you mean with Archimedes Beam - its zone of effect is a line, but it's not a single point. Every creature that touches the line gets damaged, similarly to the effect of Radiant Pillar, only with a line instead of a circle. I edited this page several times, but never thought about removing this CA, so I'm voting for returning it to the page.

[Definition of DoT For Wiki Purposes]

Yes, Gust of Wind has the same technical implementation as Glacial Thorns, but so has Blazing Tempest. All CAs that can be focused or spread over a sector depending on mouse position are implemented as separate stripes of damage that can overlay each other for focus or move separately. If you think that the fact that they technically consist of multiple stripes makes these CAs Multi-Hit rather than Area of Effect, then you should remove Blazing Tempest too, as Gust of Wind is more similar to it than to Glacial Thorns. But then you'd have to deal with the fact that most players consider these CAs Area of Effect and use them accordingly. I think that the terms of practical usage of CAs may be more important in their classification than their technical implementation in game files.

 

С точки зрения технической реализации, все фокусируемые умения представляют из себя отдельные полоски урона, своего рода снаряды. Эти полоски либо накладываются друг на друга при фокусировке, либо расходятся конусом. Если то, что полоски проходят полное расстояние, не тормозятся противниками и покрывают зону каста, не является достаточным признаком АОЕ, тогда придется убрать и Пламенеющую Бурю (на которую еще и рельеф местности влияет, останавливая распространение части полос огня). У Колючек снаряды ведут себя как стрелы оружия дальнего боя - они маленькие, бьют в основном одного противника, пробивают с шансом. Порыв Ветра и Пламенеющая Буря похожи друг на друга больше, чем на Ледяные Шипы, поэтому мне странно, что одно из этих умений было убрано, а другое осталось. Да, количество полос на конус площади у Порыва Ветра меньше, чем у Пламенеющей Бури, так что шанс промахнуться им больше, но сами полосы ведут себя примерно одинаково.

[So, this will not actually be Sacred right?]

It's funny how I can agree to ALL opinions posted in this thread, different as they are. I think that Deep Silver did only one thing wrong with Sacred 3 - they called it "Sacred 3". From what I've seen, what they are making has full potential of turning into good-looking, dynamic and fun arcade-style game, closer to beat-them-up with RPG elements genre-wise. Except that it's totally not what people think when they hear "Sacred". If it was released under any other name, I guess it would have gathered a lot of rather positive posts in a discussion in the "New and General Gaming" section. Even if it was a side project in the Sacred series, it would have got more positive reception. As it is, being called a proper Sacred 3, and taking a turn to an entirely new side, it pretty much robs the fans of a chance to see the development of the ideas seen in the previous Sacred games, hence the outpour of woe.

 

The main trouble that comes from all these changes is that Sacred 3 would be so different from Sacred 2 that it should be aimed to pretty much different target group of players. ARPGs that require some thinking like Sacred 2 and beat-them-up games are usually played by different people, though there are general gamers who play games of all genres equally. I'm not one of those gamers, I only play games that require thinking and I'm not good with keyboard-mashing that requires good reflexes and reaction speed. The more I see of Sacred 3, the less it looks like a game I'd play, so I sort of can relate to the general disappointed crowd. But! That does not mean that it would be a bad game in general. I'm not as silly as to say that Half Life is a bad game just because I won't play it - it's a good classical game, I just don't play First Person Shooters. Same with Sacred 3 - it can turn out to be a good game for its sub-genre, just not a game most the old Sacred fans would love. The "If you liked Sacred 2 you'd like Sacred 3" statement fails to work, but that does not mean that S3 is bound to be a failure.

 

In fact, I fail to understand why Deep Silver uses Sacred title for their current game. Yes, of course, it's easier to use a previously marketed title than to boost a new one, what with all advertisements and such. But the old title comes with some old reputation, and if the new installment is just too different, the name might act against it. That's about what we see now: the old fans are throughoutly unhappy with the changes, and people who might have liked this new concept probably won't look at it as they remember that Sacred series was not to their liking or just was a kind of game they don't play. The people who have good chances of enjoying the upcoming game are the "general gamers" who can play everything and liked Sacred series, but how multiple such people are?

[LazyTomcat's Designs as new Armor Sets]

Thank you for the kind comment, and special thanks for all the preliminary testing and bonus reviewing you do for the things I make. I know you don't have much free time nowadays, so thank you very much for finding some time to check the new stuff that goes into the mod. You might not be modding in new things, but you remain the essential part of the team, as your attention ensures that the mod continues to have high quality standards.

 

I'm human too, and I make mistakes sometimes, so I like to hear people's opinion about the things I make and pay attention to all critique. But there are as many opinions as there are people, so I'm not fast to jump to implement every first suggestion. All decisions made for the mod are usually made for a reason, and internal testing helps to sort out the obvious blunders (thank you again, Flix), so it requires more than one opinion to make me change things. However, it is the Community Item Mod, so if many people of the community disagree with some decision, it would be reconsidered.

 

In the Dryad discussion, I want to add only one thing about the general design of this set. The Dryad character has one noticeable OP point, and this is the ability to stack a really great amount of lifeleech %, which provides both for powerful defense and offense. Many of the melee and ranged Dryad builds exploit this feature of the class, and indeed it takes some valid reason to build the non-caster Dryad without it. I did some testing with Lifeleech Ranged Dryad in Niob: Full Detheya + Full Glaurung + Star of Astaroth (or any good yellow lifeleech % shuriken) + Goldenglade Touch + Ancient Bark, and she does not really need high armor and mitigation on items. In fact, she needs just enough defense not to be one-hitted and she easily evades or regenerates the rest. As the new set focuses on more traditional means of defense and offense, it had to have some solid modifiers to be compelling, so that in the end it wasn't easier to just swap it for full Detheya's and enjoy the benefits of the game's highest lifeleech.

 

And probably one point about the High Elf Ice set. Its chest has some good defense against Ice damage, but when you consider it as an item from the Storm-oriented set, it appears in a bit different light. The Crystal Skin buff provides good defense against Ice element, so the Storm specialist has less value in this extra defense from armor. Other Elf characters can wear the chestplate just for its defensive properties, but for them it would mean equipping an item from a set with foreign specialization, leaving them without the benefit of set bonuses, as they are unlikely to wear other pieces.

[LazyTomcat's Designs as new Armor Sets]

Wow the item boni fit the names and descriptions perfectly. And they are so good for the Dryad.

 

I dont like the look of the helmet. Maybe the names and item modifiers of the helmet and shoulders could be exchanged and then the Dryad could get her own mane. Looks awesome in my imagination^^

I'm glad that you liked the name concepts. But I don't think that there would be a major change in appearance of these sets. LazyTomcat had retired from modding, so he won't be changing the looks of these sets anymore, and even though he allowed to use his designs, I don't think it respectful to change them drastically. Myself, I won't have minded to see a furry cowl or a mask as a helmet for the Dryad, so maybe such design can be considered for a separate unique. However, any new design requires time and effort to be made, so there is no guarantee that every single idea would find its way to the game.

[LazyTomcat's Designs as new Armor Sets]

Another one of the LazyTomcat's sets to receive its own names and bonuses is the "Ice Diamond" design for the High Elf. This design is obviously icy looking, so it became an alternate aspect set for the Mystic Stormite, in a way similar to how Armaments of the Nine Hells is an alternate aspect set for the Arrant Pyromancer. The set got the name "Frozen Gems" and the item names themed around blue gemstones and beliefs about them.

 

Frozen Gems

"Gemology - The art how an almost naked elf parries a sword with a gem on her dress."

From "The 9 Lines of Defense" guide by Chattius

In the past people often attributed precious stones with mystical powers, and some of those beliefs are still strong nowadays. Superstitions about gems and items made of them became a noticeable part of modern mythology. Many books describe mages of all kinds as wearing amulets made of gems and using them in their spellcasting, sometimes storing energy or even their lives in the gemstones. With this armor design, the High Elf appears to wear nothing but adornments made of frost-covered metal and gems, but still can keep her spells and defense strong enough to survive in most situations.

 

Helmet: Mystic Sapphire

In some old texts sapphire was called the "Stone of Destiny". This stone is associated with intuition and meditation. The Elf who decides to wear this set should be the one whose destiny is to follow the Mystic Stormite path and so the item enhances the Stormite skills and spellcasting provess.

 

Torso: Unbreakable Diamond

The diamond is the hardest gemstone. It is believed that diamond does not add any new qualities to the wearer, but amplifies what is already there - both strengths and weaknesses. The item is a defensive one, and further enhances the defense against Ice element, which Stormites have already and do not really require.

 

Belt: Aquamarine of Fortitude

Mystics consider Aquamarine a stone of courage and fortitude that enhances the speed of thinking and can bring great power. The Ancient Romans and superstitious modern people believed that the aquamarine helps to cure diseases of the stomach and food poisoning. That is why this stone gave its name to the belt that has some poison armor and helps the mage to concentrate better.

 

Legs: Blue Carbuncle

Carbuncle is usually a name to any fiery-red stone, associated with burning coal and embers. But Sir Conan Doyle made the name "Blue Carbuncle" famous enough to be remembered. This item brings the fiery properties of red stones to icy-blue set, allowing for some fire protection much required by mages who use Cascading Shroud. Having better protection against fire allows the Stormite Elf to find her way even through the hottest places of Ancaria.

 

Boots: Cooling Crystal

In the past, people believed that Rock Crystals (Crystal Quartz) are the Ice Shards that could never melt. This stone is said to have cooling powers. The item adds to the Ice Shard Combat Art - Glacial Thorns and to Ice damage.

 

Arms: Clouded Mirror

The arms in this set are just silvery bracelets without blue inlays, so this is the only item that does not have a name of a stone. While mirrors are not gemstones, in the past they were rare and precious items. Many water spirits and goddesses are sometimes pictured with mirrors and combs, and the Stormite Elf can be considered a kind of spirit that commands water and ice. Being "Clouded", this mirror is not bright enough to reflect attacks back at the enemies, but still grants protection against them, as well as bonuses to "cloudy" CA - Raging Nimbus.

 

Gloves: Lazulite of Clarity

It is believed that lazulite strengthens self-discipline and focus, brings matters more clearly to the mind, and allows to solve problems easier. This item allows to cast spell faster and easier.

 

The set bonus:

Bonuses are unlocked for wearing 2, 4, 6 and 7 items.