Game Update Notes: July 22, 2015

July 22, 2015
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*** Highlights ***

- Proc effect stacking - Multiple procs can now trigger from the same triggering action. Each proc effect that is active will be processed independently. See the Spells section for details.
- Damage shields now report the damage that they do in all cases and can be directed to chat filters.
- Spells that do not take hold will now relay a more accurate description as to why they did not take hold.
- A new item, the Legend of the Oathbreaker, is available with prizes from the Legends of Norrath sets Oathbreaker, Ethernauts, and Against the Void.
- Journeyman's Rucksacks and Journeyman's Pocketed Rucksacks are now available for purchase year-round on all servers that have Omens of War unlocked.


*** Spells ***

- Beastlord - The Nature's Fury line of spells will now correctly reduce offhand damage from damage shields, instead of increasing it.
- Magician - Summon spells such as Call of the Hero no longer cause their target to dismount, unless the location that the target is being summoned to is too small of an area for that target to have summoned a mount.
- Spells that do not take hold will now relay a more accurate description as to why they did not take hold.
- Reduced the critical chance for all rain spells level 96 and above.
- The Spell Critical Chance spell effect has been split into separate Critical Chance and Critical Damage effects. Spells that affected one or the other have been changed to have equivalent effects.
- Proc effect stacking - Changed how buffs that trigger effects when spells and skills are used ("procs") interact with each other. All procs now have the ability to cast concurrently. This changes previous behavior that only allowed one proc spell to be cast at a time.
- - Example one: For a player using the Bone Staff of Wickedness and the buff Spirit of the Puma, it is now possible for both effects to proc independently each melee round. Under the previous rules, players could only cast one or the other spell per melee round.
- - Example two: For a player wielding Kyzer's Ritual Dagger augmented with The Murderer's Heart, it is now possible for both effects to proc independently each time that player casts an appropriate detrimental spell. Under the previous rules, players could only cast one or the other spell per appropriate detrimental spell cast.
- Spells can now be defined as belonging to a Spell Stacking Group. Inspecting a spell that belongs to a Spell Stacking Group will list the name of that group and the rank of that spell within the group in the spell inspection window.
- Assigned Spell Stacking Groups to buffs that trigger effects when casting spells or using skills in order to support the fact that you can now have multiple buffs with these effects active at the same time.
- - Examples: Mana Reiteration Rk. III (which is now rank 22 of the "Mana Flare" stacking group) will now be overwritten by Mana Reciprocation Rk. III (which is now rank 40 of the "Mana Flare" stacking group).
- - Mana Reciprocation Rk. III will *not* be overwritten by Ancient Hedgewizard Brew because Ancient Hedgewizard Brew is part of the stacking group "Resonant Tonics".
- Damage shield damage is now considered magical non-melee damage; this means that melee guard and melee threshold guard spell effects will no longer negate damage shield damage. Rune, spell guard, spell threshold guard, and spells that allow you to absorb damage as mana will continue to block damage shield damage.
- Taking damage from a damage shield is now an action that can decrement the use counter on some limited use spells.
- A number of changes have been implemented regarding damage shield and environmental damage messages:
- - Changed damage shield message filters from "Show All/Hide All" to "Show All/Show Mine/Hide All."
- - Added the ability to filter environmental damage messages for other players as "Show All/Hide All."
- - Added the ability to set individual colors for incoming, outgoing and others' damage shield messages, and to filter them to separate windows.
- - Damage shield messages will now display the amount of damage dealt by a defender to an attacker. Damage assignment has not changed; damage from damage shields is still not assigned to an owner.
- - Damage shield messages will now display the correct message if the amount of damage being taken was negated by spell effects such as rune or spell guard.
- - Changed the filter for spell effects that cause the bearer to take damage when they attack (such as the cleric "Mark" line of spells) so they are reported as damage shield damage. These spell effects now message the amount of damage the attacker takes.
- - Changed the filter for spell effects that cause the caster of a detrimental spell to take damage ("feedback" spells) so they are reported as damage shield damage. These spell effects now message the amount of damage the caster takes.
- - Created new filters and assignable colors for environmental damage messages (such as burning in lava, drowning, suffocating, freezing in ice, falling, or being hit by a trap). They are no longer filtered as if they were damage shield messages.
- Adjusted the spell names and the 'spell landed' and 'spell wore off' messages on a number of spells to reduce the cases where dissimilar spell lines shared the same messages or where multiple spells shared the same name.


*** AA ***

- Corrected a display issue that could occur when two existing AA lines were consolidated into a single line.
- Activated AA abilities that have their timer refunded because their spell failed to take hold or affect a target can no longer trigger spell procs.
- Enchanter - Retuned Gift of Hazy Thoughts to grant a more consistent but lower damage increase. Gift of Hazy Thoughts now triggers Gift of Chromatic Haze rather than Chromatic Haze VI, and can now be triggered by casting damage over time or stun spells in addition to direct damage spells. Gift of Chromatic Haze has a much lower damage focus than Chromatic Haze VI.
- Enchanter - Ranks 1-21 of the AA ability line Nightmare Stasis have been consolidated into ranks 4-24 of the Stasis AA ability line. The /alt act number for Nightmare Stasis (previously 748) is now 409. The functionality of Waking Nightmares, triggered when ranks 4-24 of Stasis breaks, remains unchanged.
- Enchanter - Fixed a bug that prevented the AA ability line Quickened Stasis from shortening the cast time of ranks 4-24 of Stasis.
- Enchanter - The AA ability line Hastened Nightmare Stasis has been renamed Hastened Stasis.
- Enchanter - Fixed a bug with the AA ability line Profound Visage. The ability line now multiplies the base effectiveness of the visage buffs by 20% per rank. (Ex. Rank 6 now allows the bearer of Horrifying Visage to generate 22% more aggro, up from its base 10%.)
- Enchanter - The AA ability line Surreality has been renamed Hastened Mind Over Matter.
- Enchanter - The AA ability line Doppelganger's Beckon has been renamed Hastened Doppelganger.
- Enchanter - The buff triggered by the AA ability Gracious Gift of Mana has been renamed Gracious Gift of Mana 96 to 105 and has had its messages updated to more closely match other "Gift of Mana" spells.
- Enchanter - Corrected a bug with the AA ability Hastened Mesmerization that prevented it from functioning on level 86 through 89 and level 100 to 105 spells.
- Enchanter - Ranks 1-6 of the AA ability line Mana Draw have been consolidated into ranks 2-7 of Gather Mana. The AA ability line Hastened Gathering has been renamed Hastened Gather Mana. Ranks 1-3 of the AA ability line Hastened Mana Draw have been consolidated into ranks 3-5 of Hastened Gather Mana.
- Enchanter - Corrected a bug with the AA ability line Forceful Banishment that prevented it from working on ranks 2-4 of Beguiler's Banishment.


*** Progression Servers ***

- Hunting zones in The Ruins of Kunark will spin up new load balancing versions when they are populated by enough adventurers.
- Many of the bosses in the Plane of Sky, the Plane of Hate, and the Plane of Fear will provide more of a challenge on Progression Servers.
- Antonican Traveler's Bags and Antonican Traveler's Rucksacks are now available for purchase year-round on Progression Servers.


*** Miscellaneous ***

- Added /pickzone fewestplayers to automatically pick the zone with the lowest number of players.
- Fixed a bug that would very occasionally cause you to appear unconscious even though you were full health after a divine save.
- NPCs that are in combat and are pushed by spells with a knockback component should no longer teleport directly to their most hated target if their most hated target remains stationary.
- NPCs that are pushed by spells with a knockback component should appear in their new location more quickly than before.


*** UI ***

- When viewing achievements from chat you will now see the category and sub-category that the achievement is from in the Achievements window.
- Added the ability to open an achievement in the achievements window when viewing an achievement from chat by clicking "View Mine".

- Changed -
EQUI_AchievementWnd.xml


- The EverQuest Team