ZAM Gets Update 1.2 Details from Scott Hartsman

Editor-in-Chief Darryl "Togikagi" Gangloff sat down with Rift's executive producer to get some details on the game's next major update, which includes a Looking for Group tool and much more.

ZAM: Switching gears a bit, the wardrobe feature sounds cool. Will you basically be able to save outfits and then swap them on the fly with the push of a button?

Hartsman: That's exactly it, yeah. We built in lots of wardrobe sets into your character window. You get one right off the bat and then you can unlock more later on. One of the things we're looking to add in future updates is more reward sets and more cosmetic stuff. We've heard a lot of comments, and we agree with them, that people want to look like some NPCs.

ZAM: So you mean cosmetic items that are focused on appearance rather than stats?

Hartsman: Exactly. For example, the way the system works is if you're a warrior who can wear plate, if you're putting on armor you have to wear plate. We don't want warriors to be able to wear everything in the game while mages are just stuck in cloth. But in the wardrobe slot we have items marked as costume items or warbdrobe items, and anyone can equip those. Like the snow guard look from Iron Pine Peak and the desert bandit look from Shimmersand; there are all kinds of cool outfits we can make.

We've got all these unique hats in the game right now. One of my favorites is the Team Fortress hat that we did with those guys. We're all such Team Fortress 2 fans, which is how that came around. I would love to be able to wear that thing, but I can't because I can't put it in my gear slot. All of the hats and non-stat items will be switching over to become costume items in the update.

ZAM: You're adding your fifth role slot in this update. Can we expect more roles to be added in the future, or is this a specific instance?

Hartsman: It's something we wanted to ease into. Adding new capacity like that, depending on the number of people who take us up on it, does add new overhead and add new storage. We just wanted to add one and see how many people use and see if it would make sense to offer more in the future. It's definitely something we're looking at with an open mind.

We were expecting people would generally use a role to mean, “this is my healing role. This is my DPS role.” But the thing that really surprised us with the class system is that people will use multiple builds for the same role. We're seeing people use entire role slots just for minor tweaks. It's fun!

ZAM: The Update 1.2 test notes have a section devoted to slivers. Can you give us some more details on this feature?

Hartsman: The short version is that it allows us to officially support 10-man raid content. That's the big draw. Think of it almost like an overland kind of instancing. You go to a place in the world, you see a portal between here and another reality, you go into the portal and you're in the same spot you're in, but it's all different.

ZAM: So kind of like an open world instance? You're in the same location, just instanced?

Hartsman: Right, with new creatures and encounters. It's a private raid instance for you and your raid. Fictionally, it's supposed to be an alternate reality or alternate timeline. For example, maybe stuff has gone bad and you need to set things right. Or maybe you need to go knock somebody over before their reality starts pushing in on Telara.

I'm totally just using this as an example, but one of things I think would be incredibly cool is if I'm a Defiant guy and in this alternate reality, Meridian has crumbled and has been taken over by the Plane of Death. Wouldn't it be cool to have to raid through Meridian to set things right?

ZAM: Definitely! So you can basically just do whatever you want lore-wise with these slivers.

Hartsman: Exactly. We can do all kinds of great stuff. It's a way to tell some of these offshoot stories or really creative ideas that wouldn't fit in the main storyline. It's a piece of tech we've been working on for a little while now. The fact that we get to use it to support 10-man raiders makes me very happy.

ZAM: Can you tell me a little bit about the Gilded Sanctum raid that's coming in 1.2 with the sliver system?

Hartsman: The entire theme of this update is all based around Laethys, who is one of the dragons of the Plane of Earth. The Golden Maw is the cult faction surrounding Laethys. This entire update is themed around Laethys and the Golden Maw in general. Having an area where Laethys' forces have actually taken over Shimmersand seemed like a great fit, and it just all came together at the right time.

ZAM: Two new Ascended powers will help players look for these slivers. Do you have any plans to use these powers in any other way?

Hartsman: Absolutely. We're thinking about doing it for a couple different things. Artifacts inside of instances, possibly separate artifacts. Definitely as we start adding new types of content, we are absolutely looking to integrate some of the new abilities that we're going to be adding. We're actually looking at adding new Ascended powers in general to get more gameplay value out of the artifact game and the land control game.

ZAM: So could players someday get a power that will help them find artifacts throughout the world?

Hartsman: This isn't something we're doing right now, but speaking of future potential, I do think we have some pretty compelling gameplay going on with our artifacts, and I think there's some thing we can do to make it even more fun and a bit more of a game. I think there's some potential there for some future add-ons.

ZAM: So there are also some new zone events coming in Update 1.2, such as tower defense and escort events. What can you tell me about them?

Hartsman: One of the things we've always been talking about is introducing new types of gameplay and events. Right now we have our colossus events, which are most common. Then we have our epic scale zone events. And now in 1.2 we have some new types of zone events with new types of gameplay.

For one of them, the Guardians and Defiant both build their respective colossus and have them fight it out. There's another one in Iron Pine which is all about defending the bulwarks. It's more of a defense one than a “go charge around and clean up all the rifts” kind of thing. Then there's the Shimmersand caravan escort, because we know everybody loves escort quests. We played it internally quite a bit and we liked it. We thought it would be interesting to throw in the mix and see what people think about it.

We are also adding resource-themed rifts because they're all about crafting resources, and then players started calling them crafting rifts. So we said, “fine, they're crafting rifts.” Whenever players name something first, it's the one that sticks. It's a way for us to give out more crafting rewards and crafting progression tokens.

ZAM: You have a Recruit-a-Friend feature coming up that gives rewards. What are the perks of this feature?

Hartsman: I like Recruit-a-Friend because it gives me something for something I was going to do anyway. Recruit-a-Friend is one of those kinds of systems that every game should have. You're doing something that is awesome for players and awesome for developers. With our Recruit-a-Friend you're able to get three different rewards for three different sets of friends, including Courage, a faithful hound that is adorable beyond belief. You can go all the way up to a mount. Once you've recruited somebody and you guys are BFFs, you can summon each other anywhere in the world.

Players will also get keys to give to friends that give them seven days of access, which is how they can kick everything off. If they decide to purchase the game after their trial ends, that's when rewards are given out.

ZAM: How long does the summoning last? Will it be permanent or for a period of time?

Hartsman: Forever! That's what the third “F” means in BFF! (laughs) It's all about helping people play with other people. I don't see why we'd want to put a limit on that. I'm pretty sure you can't do it every 20 seconds though.

ZAM: You've been doing a bunch of free trial weekends. Do you ever plan on making a constant free trial that anyone can try out at any time?

Hartsman: At some point in the future we will absolutely do that. For us, it's all been about the speed with which programs can be developed and launched in a way in which everything works. I wouldn't want us to rush it and have it not work.

ZAM: Is there anything else you wanted to mention about Update 1.2?

Hartsman: We will be aiming to have Facebook and possibly Tumblr status integration and update integration in the game by Update 1.2. It's currently on track, but you can never be 100% certain until it's up on the test server. But we're really confident this is going to make it. Every month or two we try to add another thing to integrate. First it was Twitter and then it was YouTube. Facebook is the natural next step.

We also have some improved rewards planned. We are upgrading the loot you get for plaques of achievement. We've also worked to make PvP more rewarding as well through better favor payouts, better prestige payouts, better dailies and higher quality gear. We weren't in love with the amount of upgrade that a lot of these items felt like, so we wanted to improve them. If you have one already, it will just get upgraded when the new stats go out.

ZAM: Your team is really leading the path with social integration.

Hartsman: I think a lot of the social toys can be kind of cool as long as you give it to people in a way that they also think it's cool. There's a lot of social trickery and social mechanics that work on Facebook and on social games that are not MMO audience kinds of things. For us, we want to give you a tool that you can choose to use or not.

YouTube was real work. I want to say two engineers worked on it full-time for probably a month, and then another engineer worked on the UI for it for two to three weeks. It was a lot of work, and that's why you tend not to see it in MMOs.

ZAM: Thanks so much for your time!

Darryl "Togikagi" Gangloff, Editor-in-Chief

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Comments

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GB
# May 03 2011 at 7:59 PM Rating: Decent
Weeks ago, didn't they say a guild bank was coming in 1.2?
GB
# May 04 2011 at 9:10 AM Rating: Excellent
**
295 posts
Kruncher21 wrote:
Weeks ago, didn't they say a guild bank was coming in 1.2?


Scott Hartsman said in March that guild banks could possibly be coming in Update 1.2. The feature isn't ready yet, but he's confirmed that they're currently being developed.
Recruit-a-Friend BFF
# May 01 2011 at 12:55 PM Rating: Decent
I play with my wife and I would love to connect our accounts with the BFF tool. However, she already has an account. What are the chances of getting keys to link two, three or five accounts together without using the Recruit-a-Friend?
LFG system will fail
# Apr 28 2011 at 11:06 PM Rating: Decent
honestly it takes me 1 hour ( at least ) to make grp on my server and am using the lvl 1-9 channel since it global channel and all lvls can see it and also the lvl 50 channel, and since am using those 2 channels to make 1 and dosent work i dont see how the LFG system gonna help, basically its fail befor even using it and for those who say its nice maybe you should go look again on how long it takes to make a grp while you are spaming, so befor trying to make it live i think Trion need to have ppl from the company itself to login on each server and actualy see how long does it take the ppl to form 1 single grp then think of a real way to solve it, and i do agree with the guy who said they should have cross-server LFG coz thats the only way to solve it else i say you should delete the system you made and leave the LFG as it is right now no need to put something that will fail

edit : been lvl 50 since like 7 days now and did only 1 expert dungeon since i can hardly find members and always end up going pvp

Edited, Apr 29th 2011 1:19am by Kurogane77
LFG system will fail
# May 04 2011 at 6:23 AM Rating: Decent
and you will not find a group like that. and if you do you ill prob fail. THats why there are guilds for expert runs. thats why spamming 1-9 lvls wont help you. i always go with guild. ask in 50 channel only if we are short 1 or 2 ppl.
LFG system will fail
# May 01 2011 at 10:49 AM Rating: Decent
doesnt take more more than 10 minutes to form a grp on my server and its an rp server. This feature just automates the LFG by putting you in a quee.
LFG system will fail
# May 02 2011 at 10:53 AM Rating: Decent
That all depends on your server and faction bro. Some servers are very high Guardian population and others are the opposite. Groups tend to form relatively slowly on my server (High Guardian pop) as there are INFINITE dps'ers available and a very limited number of tanks/heals. My prediction on release of the LFG tool (for my server) is DPS @ 70+ min wait times. Healers @ 10ish min wait times and Tanks insta queue.
i have to agree with cross servering
# Apr 28 2011 at 8:02 PM Rating: Decent
there is pretty much a very high defiant population so i think that side would be quick to pop with a que but guardians do not have a high enough population on most servers (or all) to have quick que times. pvp on my server is sometimes a very long que and most times they are not full warfronts leaving them disadvantaged to either side.
Would have loved to have heard that they were fixing the apoc quests since i have loads and loads of outfitter drops.... been wondering why they and mining seem to be the only ones to drop special quests since during beta i think all of them spawned a quest occasionally.
yoo
# Apr 28 2011 at 10:38 AM Rating: Decent
CANT wait for LFG system.. (this reminds me of the FFXI LFG & FFXI was a very social game compare to wow) im so tired of playing solo =/
looks great
# Apr 28 2011 at 9:49 AM Rating: Decent
Dungeon Finder = awesome (no cross server please)
Wardobe = awesome... make cloaks! And for cryin' out loud, stop making our weapons disappear when we mount. Where does a staff larger than my body actually go, and why can't I see it go there? It looks tacky.
Sliver = Secret Cow Level. Go Trion!
Oh, and for the 6th Role onward... if you are going to give us so many Role choices (thank you), please allow us at some point to Name our own Roles.


Edited, Apr 28th 2011 11:50am by Azidonis
looks great
# Apr 28 2011 at 12:22 PM Rating: Decent
It's worthless to all the low pop servers since it is not cross-server.
looks great
# Apr 28 2011 at 10:41 AM Rating: Decent
You can already name your own roles. If you just click on the name, it lets you name the role.
don't schmack me, Togi!
# Apr 27 2011 at 11:57 PM Rating: Decent
*****
12,846 posts
You look like a young Hannibal Lecter >.> please don't eat my brain

awesome article.
don't schmack me, Togi!
# Apr 28 2011 at 10:58 AM Rating: Excellent
**
295 posts
niobia wrote:
You look like a young Hannibal Lecter >.> please don't eat my brain

awesome article.


That's a headshot of Scott Hartsman. Your brain is safe!
Worthless Tool
# Apr 27 2011 at 8:19 PM Rating: Default
The LFG tool is 100% absolutely WORTHLESS for running dungeons if it's not cross-server. I will not be re-subscribing until it is made cross-server. This does nothing at all to fix the population problems on the launch day servers that Trion effed up.

I can't believe how short-sighted and ignorant Scott and the others are being about this. A little work and some cross-server specific tools to allow community building across the servers and it would solve a majority of the problems.

1. Cross-server friends lists.
2. Cross-server chat channels.
3. Cross-server groups for dungeons and instanced raids, created/formed through the cross-server friends list.
4. Use the /ignore list to determine who not to group with.

Those would allow you to build a commuinity that spans servers and it wouldn't matter what server you got stuck with and wouldn't have to transfer to be with friends for the most part and wouldn't have to worry about timezone issues either.
Worthless Tool
# Apr 28 2011 at 9:57 AM Rating: Decent
JonathanTheBlack wrote:
The LFG tool is 100% absolutely WORTHLESS for running dungeons if it's not cross-server. I will not be re-subscribing until it is made cross-server. This does nothing at all to fix the population problems on the launch day servers that Trion effed up.


Good. We don't want you to re-subscribe anyway.

Quote:

I can't believe how short-sighted and ignorant Scott and the others are being about this. A little work and some cross-server specific tools to allow community building across the servers and it would solve a majority of the problems.


I can't believe how short-sighted and ignorant you are about bashing something you haven't even tried yet.

Quote:

1. Cross-server friends lists.
2. Cross-server chat channels.
3. Cross-server groups for dungeons and instanced raids, created/formed through the cross-server friends list.
4. Use the /ignore list to determine who not to group with.


Do you really want to have the entire BattleGroup in one chat channel? Do you have any idea how terribly bad that channel would be? You would have to make a macro to leave the channel when you left the instance. You thought Barrens chat was bad...

Quote:

Those would allow you to build a commuinity that spans servers and it wouldn't matter what server you got stuck with and wouldn't have to transfer to be with friends for the most part and wouldn't have to worry about timezone issues either.


The biggest problem with cross-server anything is that there is no consequence for bad behavior. Unless and until they find a way to solve that problem, they should not implement cross-server, in my opinion.

Also, there is a server community, something we should actually pay attention to. These are the thousands of people on your own shard and faction who play in the same "arena" as you do. Shouldn't you get to know them first, before traveling out into the cross-realm-pug wilderness?
Worthless Tool
# Apr 28 2011 at 12:11 PM Rating: Decent
Azidonis wrote:

Quote:

I can't believe how short-sighted and ignorant Scott and the others are being about this. A little work and some cross-server specific tools to allow community building across the servers and it would solve a majority of the problems.


I can't believe how short-sighted and ignorant you are about bashing something you haven't even tried yet.

WoW started with an LFD tool that was NOT cross-server. It failed. Hence, they now have a cross-server tool. Trion shouldn't make the same ******* mistakes that Blizzard made.

Quote:

Do you really want to have the entire BattleGroup in one chat channel? Do you have any idea how terribly bad that channel would be? You would have to make a macro to leave the channel when you left the instance. You thought Barrens chat was bad...

Player created cross-server channels. Not official ones that everyone joines. Player created cross-server chat channels with full ownership and moderation abilities like an irc chat channel has. EverQuest2 has had cross-server communication for ages. Even cross-game between EQ1, EQ2, SWG, and more.

Quote:

The biggest problem with cross-server anything is that there is no consequence for bad behavior. Unless and until they find a way to solve that problem, they should not implement cross-server, in my opinion.

There's no consequences right now. I made a warrior, specced him heavily for tanking and I still get groups even though I acted like an ***, called people names, and ridiculed them for stupid **** both in zone chat, server level chat, and in groups. I STILL GET GROUPS DESPITE THAT. There are no consequences. People are just happy to have a tank and a healer and will accept any kind of punishment just to be in a group for a dungeon.

Quote:
Also, there is a server community, something we should actually pay attention to. These are the thousands of people on your own shard and faction who play in the same "arena" as you do. Shouldn't you get to know them first, before traveling out into the cross-realm-pug wilderness?

Try hundreds, not thousands. My server is a ghost town. Same server LFG tool will not do anything to fix this problem.
Worthless Tool
# May 01 2011 at 11:21 AM Rating: Decent
JonathanTheBlack wrote:
Azidonis wrote:

Quote:

I can't believe how short-sighted and ignorant Scott and the others are being about this. A little work and some cross-server specific tools to allow community building across the servers and it would solve a majority of the problems.


I can't believe how short-sighted and ignorant you are about bashing something you haven't even tried yet.

Quote:
WoW started with an LFD tool that was NOT cross-server. It failed. Hence, they now have a cross-server tool. Trion shouldn't make the same @#%^ing mistakes that Blizzard made.


actually this is why many people left wow with many more leaving and complaining on how wow has become a worthless casual game hub with no social interaction. The cross server LFG became a farm for badges I don't care who is in grp kinda deal with a bunch of asses making fun of other players who dont have as much time as they to to have gear. Even worse had ppl asking why is a fully geared paladin tank doing Heroics when you dont need gear. And answering to have fun would leave them confused. Basically cross server LFG makes ppl forget anything besides the " Oh we can repeat dungeons over and over to get badge gear for raids" wich isnt the purpose of the heroics, if you feel the purpose for endgame 5 man content is to gear up for 10 mans then please unsub from RIFT and go play wow.

Quote:

Do you really want to have the entire BattleGroup in one chat channel? Do you have any idea how terribly bad that channel would be? You would have to make a macro to leave the channel when you left the instance. You thought Barrens chat was bad...

Quote:

Player created cross-server channels. Not official ones that everyone joines. Player created cross-server chat channels with full ownership and moderation abilities like an irc chat channel has. EverQuest2 has had cross-server communication for ages. Even cross-game between EQ1, EQ2, SWG, and more.

Im ok with cross server chat channels in the form or a social MSN just like Real ID is in wow. Even more if there was an external method that confirmed friends can send messages from a MSN to the in game and vice versa. But frankly id be happy with MSN in game integration with filters that alow me to choose wich of my social lists are alowed to contact me while in game. Its been done before in some asian games and it works simply blocks all lists not acepted during game and auto replies them with im in xxxxxxx i will get back to you when i get out of the game. and saves a copy on the original Messenger service.
Quote:

The biggest problem with cross-server anything is that there is no consequence for bad behavior. Unless and until they find a way to solve that problem, they should not implement cross-server, in my opinion.

Quote:

There's no consequences right now. I made a warrior, specced him heavily for tanking and I still get groups even though I acted like an ***, called people names, and ridiculed them for stupid sh*t both in zone chat, server level chat, and in groups. I STILL GET GROUPS DESPITE THAT. There are no consequences. People are just happy to have a tank and a healer and will accept any kind of punishment just to be in a group for a dungeon.

certainly you aren't in my server, in mine they get blacklisted and there's a guild channel for all guild masters to file complaints and manage the community, its a guild wide effort to filter bad apples out and offer guilds to the non bad apples. Server wide we have had guilds who opposed to the system and basically they just vanished once their members couldn't get into grps they started quitting the guilds and joining others who gave better experiences or winging it solo. But you can say the 50 chat there's not 1 person who we don't know and we know who's an alt of who (for those of us with multiple 50's). Its called communication and im happy my server doesn't suffer from low population (although the wait times to get in on special occasions are bad >.<)
Quote:
Also, there is a server community, something we should actually pay attention to. These are the thousands of people on your own shard and faction who play in the same "arena" as you do. Shouldn't you get to know them first, before traveling out into the cross-realm-pug wilderness?

Quote:

Try hundreds, not thousands. My server is a ghost town. Same server LFG tool will not do anything to fix this problem.



Maybe is because of how the people act in the server I know mines in the thousands specially many new players trying out the server and staying. If your 1~9 is silent then id really suggest switching servers.
Worthless Tool
# Apr 28 2011 at 12:00 AM Rating: Decent
Bye..and cross server friends are worthless..just like in wow. Its not cross server because they don't want to kill the communication between players. AKA end up with wow servers. ..I just say that because your obviously a wow player. Ta-ta
Worthless Tool
# Apr 27 2011 at 11:50 PM Rating: Decent
bye
Worthless Tool
# Apr 27 2011 at 8:31 PM Rating: Decent
Can you say that again but in a Yosimite Sam accent? Woooooooooooorthththtthththlesssthththtth.

HAHAHAHAHAH Too funny.
Awesome
# Apr 27 2011 at 7:34 PM Rating: Decent
The Rift team, even through a stumble like the last big event, are just incredible attuned to what we, the player base, want.

Amazing stuff, guys. Keep it up!
Optize your graphics Engine Now!
# Apr 27 2011 at 6:05 PM Rating: Decent
Yeah Zam tell them to fix and optimize the graphics cause in some areas i get 45 fps with gtx 580 sli.Rediculous optimization.I cant even set x16 anisotropic.
If they dont do sth on this soon they will be lost.
Optize your graphics Engine Now!
# Apr 28 2011 at 8:34 AM Rating: Decent
....idiots* They have one of the most stable engine's ever used in a mmo... Maybe realize a pc these days doesn't just get fps from Cards...(45fps; that's just awful o.0 *lays out the sarcasm~)

Edited, Apr 28th 2011 10:35am by Yorazzy
:)
# Apr 27 2011 at 4:50 PM Rating: Decent
37 posts
I am really looking forward to patch 1.2 as well. I love the idea of the Slivers and what alternative realities can bring to the game. I also like the idea of a wardrobe :)

In general, great stuff is coming in an already superb game. Thanks Scott for the answers and zam for the article :)
great!
# Apr 27 2011 at 2:28 PM Rating: Decent
I am really, really looking forward to patch 1.2 and all the features it will bring...

I was scared how LFG will work, but now I am satisfied, great, even be able to find teammate for group quest will be very usable, I am sure.

Thanks Scott and all RIFT team for super work and good luck for making RIFT even better game (altough its great now too) :))
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