Ethereal Awakening

If you thought the Frontiers were dead before, that was nothing! The "Doppleganger Invasion" event is over, and now begins the "Ethereal Awakening" event - consisting of, umm, ghost keeps. You can read the initial announcement here and read a guide Mythic has written here. Event? Campaign? Event leading up to a Campaign? Who knows.

Housing Love Starts

Patch 1.94b starts the housing changes promised for this patch - by making the higher tier houses much, much, much! cheaper. This seems to address a problem that doesn't exist, but they say changes to hookpoints will be in an upcoming patch.

New Server Type Poll

If Regular Classic is just not good enough, and you want some Extra Strength Classic...

The poll is up at http://www.camelotherald.com/polls/, and is open to - well, everyone. The full text is:

Would you be interested in playing on a new Dark Age of Camelot server that does the following?

• Brings back the Old Frontiers territory
• Brings back the old Keeps, Relics, and related systems
• Does not include the following systems or components:
  • Master levels
  • Champion levels
  • Artifacts
  • Minotaur Relics
  • Champion weapons
  • Mythirians
• Focuses on the "classic" zone territories that existed prior to the expansion packs
• Focuses mainly on the class types that existed prior to the expansion packs
• No buffbots, but rather a universally available buffing option

Answers:

• I am a current subscriber and would play on this new server type.
• I am a former subscriber and would come back to play on this new server type.
• I am a current subscriber and enjoy where I play. I don't need a new server type.
• I have not played Dark Age of Camelot, but I may check it out for this new server type.
• Maybe.
• No thanks.

If you have friends who might be interested in this type of server ruleset, have them stop by and answer the poll!

I think the idea of a new server is horrible and encourage everyone to vote whatever form of "no" best applies to you. I know that many people think this is a great idea, so allow me to explain my position...

I don't doubt that this would bring many former subscribers back to the game for a time. I don't think it would be as many as are posting on message boards that they'd return, but certainly many would. And the server would probably be quite successful - just as all new server types have been.

However, I do not think those people woule stay for the long haul. This new server does not address the issues that led to most departures from the game. DAoC has not gone from 250,000 players to 50,000 or so because people didn't like New Frontiers and Champion Abilities. Removing them isn't going to make DAoC a match for whatever game they have since moved on to.

And regardless of what is removed, players can't return to the game they loved years ago; the game has changed too much, the players have changed too much, and the rest of the genre has changed too much (what seemed awesome when EQ and UO were the main competitors may not seem so with newer games out there). The vast majority of former subscribers would end up leaving the game to once again be former subscribers.

Meanwhile, the other servers would lose a significant amount of people to this new server. Anyone who was not willing to switch would find themselves on a cluster with even fewer players than are there now. Some of these players would quit - as happened on regular servers as a result of classic servers. After the eventual decline of the Extra Strength Classic servers, those players who moved over would return to their former server to find it struggling even more than before, with the rate of decline increased. End result? New servers dead. Old servers dead. DAoC dead...

I think this new server type is a strange type of poison pill that will do incredible harm to DAoC not by failing, but by succeeding. (Though this is, admittedly, the most pessimistic possibility.)

So - if you don't play DAoC currently, or for whatever reason don't care about its long-term future, sure, vote for this server; it'll be fun for a few weeks or months. However, if you want to see the game live on and for Mythic to find a different way forward, please vote no.

Returning to the past is no way to move into the future.